The Marauders vs The NewMs
by believeinmagic14
Summary: Everyone knows the marauders, but what nobody knows about is their rival group and sometimes good friends, the NewMs. takes place in 7th year. JPLE, SBOC, RLOC;; read and review please! Rated T for some language.
1. The Train Ride

**Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling obviously. if i was i wouldn't be writing a fanfiction story, now would i?**

Chapter 1: The Train Ride

(James's POV)

"Oi Prongs!!"

I turned around and saw Sirius running at me with Remus and Peter walking quickly behind him.

"Hi Padfoot…er, why are you so hoppy today? Exactly how much sugar have you had this morning?"

"Hmmm…I had 2 boxes of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, 10 chocolate frogs, a couple of Fizzing Whizbees, 3 toffees, some chocolate chip cookies ----…"

"Padfoot, I thought that your family hardly fed you regular food, let alone give you sweets. Where did you get all of that food?" I asked.

"It's my fault," said Remus. "When he stayed at my house, I decided to give him a "care package". Ideally it was supposed to last until Christmas, but as you can tell it hasn't."

"Ooooh, ooooh! Lookie, Prongsie got the Head Boy badge!...wait, I thought Moony over here was a shoo-in!"

"Padfoot, you were with me when we got our letters. Don't you think you would have noticed if a Head Boy badge fell out of it? Congrats Prongs."

"Thanks. I wonder who the Head Girl is. I hope its Lily…"

Aaaah, Lily Evans. She was the love of my life. Well actually I've been asking her out every day since 4th year, but to no avail. This was my last year to get Lily back and I wasn't going to mess this up. Yes, get her back. You see back at the end of 3rd year we went out for about a week. Then some git pulled a prank on her; she thought that I pulled that prank. "Well I can understand why she might think that, after all I am a Marauder, but my pranks are aimed at those nasty Slytherins, especially Snivellus. I would never pull a prank on my lovely Lily.) Needless to say, Lily broke up with me and I've been trying to win her back ever since.

Sirius elbowed me in the ribs.

"What is it Padfo—uh hi Lily," I said straightening up.

Lily ignored me and said, " Hi Remus. Have you seen Charlotte? I can't see over Potter's big head."

"Sorry Lily I haven't."

Lily and Remus started to talk and then she stopped and stared at me with a mixture of horror, unbelief, and disgust all over her face. This couldn't be good.

"You're Head Boy? Oh god…"

"Don't worry Evans, we were surprised too," said Sirius smirking.

"Shut up Padfoot," I said. "Yeah, I'm Head Boy. Why do you ask Lily-flower?"

"This is why _Potter_!" and lily shoved something into my face. It was the Head Girl badge.

"Why Lily-flower, this is wonderful! Just think we get to spend hours together!"

Lily laughed sourly.

"Hmmph, Dumbledore must have been a bit tipsy when he picked you for Head Boy because no one in their right state of mind would pick you."

"That hurt Lily that went straight to my heart" I said clutching my heart. Sirius started to laugh, while Lily glared at me. Sirius and I call it the infamous Evans glare because she's seems to perfected her glare since 1st year. All of a sudden Lily's face lit up.

"I knew you couldn't resist me Lily-flower. See you're smiling," I said.

Lily started to scowl again.

"For your information _Potter_, I would never smile at you willingly. Secondly, I just spotted Elizabeth and she's headed this way.

Elizabeth strolled over with a smile on her face. She's Remus's girlfriend and one of Lily's best mates. It's quite funny actually. Remus has already gotten the girl of his dreams while Sirius and I have yet to win ours. Even Peter had a "girlfriend" named Serena (they aren't official yet.)

"Hi Lily! Hi Remus! Hi boys."

"Beth, let's go find a compartment and wait for Charlotte and Violet."

"What's the rush Emerie? We have like 10 minutes." I can never figure out what 'Emerie' stand for. In fact Lily, Charlotte, Elizabeth, and Violet all have these little nicknames. I asked Lily about them once and she told me to bugger off. Typical.

"No Girl Scout, now!" and Lily proceeded to drag Elizabeth onto the train.

"Speaking of, we should be getting a compartment ourselves otherwise all the good ones will be gone," said Remus.

"Awww…Moony you're a party pooper, but okay let's go," exclaimed Sirius and he started to hop to the train. Peter started to giggle and Remus and I looked gave each other a look. Then we chase Sirius to the compartment.

(Lily's POV)

I just couldn't believe it! That prat James Potter had become Head Boy! Impossible! At first I thought that it was some joke until Sirius and Remus assured me that it was most definitely true. Aaargh!

Elizabeth and I found a compartment and waited for Charlotte and Violet. Finally they showed up and just in time too because the train started lurch forward as they opened the door. Unfortunately right after them were those dratted Marauders.

"Hello ladies. May we sit with you guys?" asked Sirius.

"No you can't Black otherwise Lily here might combust if she had to sit next to Potter," said Charlotte half teasing me and half flirting with Sirius. Those two are always flirting with each other. Honestly, I don't get what they see in each other at all, but whatever. Violet doesn't know why they don't just go out because it's that obvious. They would match even more, though, if Sirius learned what a long term relationship was and Charlotte stopped wearing sports jerseys whenever she could.

"I'll take that as a yes then Charlie. C'mon men, let's move in!"

"Men? Ha!" I scoffed. "More like boys to me."

Sirius frowned.

"Hey! We aren't boys! We are manly men!"

"Hate to disappoint you, but the day the Marauders become manly men will be when Lily goes out with James or James stops asking Lily out, when you actually can hold onto a girlfriend for longer then 2 weeks, when Remus gets drunk, when Peter stops wetting his pants, when Charlotte willingly puts on a dress, when Elizabeth can get above an 'A' in any class, and when I fall in love with a Ravenclaw," said Violet.

"Vi, I'm warning you…"

"HEY! I resent that!"

"Actually my longest relationship has been 2 weeks, 1 day." "Close enough."

"I hate Firewhiskey!" "But you're a Marauder; you'll end up liking it someday."

"I've stopped, well you know." "Look down Peter." "Oh."

"Uh, why would I want to wear a dress? We're talking major uncomfortable and very impractical."

"I've gotten an 'E' on a test once."

It went on like that for awhile with all of us saying something and then Violet would retort. Eventually Sirius bet Violet that all of those things would happen and she accepted. After all what would we be if we didn't fight the Marauders? After awhile we started talking about Quidditch.

"Charlotte, Violet are you guys excited for our last Quidditch season?" asked Sirius. (Charlotte was a chaser, Violet was a Beater, Sirius was another chaser, and James was Seeker.)

"Hell yeah! We're going to shove Slytherin's team into the ground!" shouted Charlotte.

'Who's the captain, by the way?" asked Violet.

Sirius put his arm around James.

"Why Prongsie here has not only become Head Boy, but has also became Team captain!"

"You gotta be kidding me!" I shouted. "Maybe all of the teachers got drunk one night! Why would anyone make Potter Gryffindor Quidditch captain, let alone Head boy?!" I started to scowl.

"Awww, Lilyflower what can I do to put a smile back on your pretty face?" asked James.

"Hmmm…how about you stop calling me Lilyflower? And it would also help if you stopped being an egotistical, selfish, bigheaded, stupid prat who's like an annoying fly that won't leave me alone!"

There was complete silence. Charlotte, Elizabeth, and violet were looking at me with concern. Sirius, Remus, Peter, and James were all gaping.

"Lily is it that time of month again?" asked James. "I can't be all that bad."

I slapped him across his face.

"Why, I oughta---"

Charlotte pinned my arms behind me.

"Calm down Emerie! James was only teasing, right James? (James nodded while rubbing his cheek. Serves him right!) Right. Oh look at that, it's time to get off the train. You first Lily," she said, grabbing my trunk and her, while pushing me out of the compartment.

This was definitely going to be the worst year ever!

**A/N: So what do you think so far??? please review!**


	2. Sirus's Speech

**Disclaimer: Once again, not JK Rowling and any characters that you regonize are not mine.**

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Chapter 2: Sirius's Speech

(Charlotte's POV)

I'm Charlotte Mcgriffen. I have blond hair with pink streaks and ice-blue eyes. A lot of people tell me that I'm one of the prettiest girls in our year (some of the others coincidentally being my best buds Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet.) I'm also a Chaser on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, but I like playing football and soccer too (I learned about them from my dad; he's a muggle, while my mum is a witch.)

At the banquet James and Lily were left to sit next to each other because I was sitting next to Sirius, who was sitting next to Remus, who was sitting next to Elizabeth, who was sitting next to Violet, who was sitting next to Lily. (Peter was off sitting with some girl whose name starts with an S, I can't quite remember.) Considering the near death experience Lily had earlier on the train I was surprised when she didn't flinch or even scowl. All of us were getting along fine until Lily yelled," James Potter! Didn't I tell you never to call me Lilyflower ever again?!!!" Everyone looked over, including the professors and those nasty Slytherins. Sirius took this opportunity to hop onto the table amidst shouts from the professors to sit down.

"Attention students, especially first years, and professors! I need your complete attention! (As if we didn't already have it!) Okay to my left is James Potter; to my right is Lily Evans. You can often find them yelling at each other. Why? Well James usually flirts with Lily resulting in her hurting him physically and verbally. For example let's take fight #157 in 5th year: someone decide to be funny and locked the two in a broom closet. Let's just say I'm still not sure that all of Europe's ears are fully healed from Lily's screaming. So first years do not be afraid if all of a sudden James and lily start to argue. However if they're actually getting along, then immediately bring them to the Hospital Wing! Thanks for listening!"

As soon as Sirius sat down, the entire Great Hall started to laugh. I looked over at Lily and James. They were both blushing and Lily looked like she wanted to strangle Sirius. Comments started to ring out from various tables such as:

"Don't make fun of Lily! James will hex you into the next dimension!"

"If you see James sloughing around and acting depressed, it's probably because Lily turned him down again!"

"Sometimes we get earthquakes. Usually it's just Lily yelling at James!"

Each time someone made a comment like that everybody started to laugh harder and Lily and James got even redder if possible. Then Dumbledore stood up and everyone became quiet.

"It is almost the end of the banquet, so I would like to introduce our Head Boy and Girl. Could you two please stand up?"

Lily and James both stood up and the Great Hall started to roar with laughter again. Even Dumbledore was chuckling. As they sat down Lily looked like she wanted to sink into the floor and James looked really uncomfortable. Dumbledore spoke again.

"Silence, that's enough. Congratulations and many of the teachers wish you both good luck. (Some people snickered.) I hope that all of you have a good year. After everyone leaves I would like to see the Head Boy and Girl. Thanks."

Right after Dumbledore finished, we all started to file out of the Great hall. Elizabeth, Violet, Sirius, Remus, Peter, and I waited outside the doors for Lily and James. After about 10 minutes they both came out. Lily looked like she was going to be sick so I hurried over.

"What's wrong Emerie? Something's wrong; I can tell," I said.

"Well, there's good news and bad news. The good news is that there will be a Halloween Ball this year. The bad news is that I have to spend a minimum of 5 hours a week working with Potter on preparations."

"It could be worse," stated Violet.

"How so Vi?" I asked her.

"Well Lily and James could be sharing a lot more than Head duties together, if you get my drift…" she said trailing off.

Lily looked at her aghast.

"Oh my god! You are truly disgusting Violet Schmidt! I can't believe you would say that! C'mon Elizabeth! We're going to back slowly away from the crazy woman and run to the Gryffindor common room. 1…2…3… RUN!!!"

Lily and Elizabeth started to run down the hall with Violet close behind them. Great they left me alone again! But then I noticed that the Marauders were walking slowly down the hall so I ran to catch up with them.

"Hey guys! Wait up!"

"Okay Charlie! (That's what they call me most of the time because I'm a tomboy.)"

'So do you guys have any pranks planned for tomorrow? Hopefully towards the Slytherins?"

"Of course we do Charlie. After all we are the Marauders," James.

"But I thought---" started Peter.

"Shut up Wormtail," said Sirius.

"But you guys said that---"

"Not now Wormtail," said Remus.

"No go ahead Peter. What were you thinking?' I asked sweetly, while "glaring" at the others. They "glared" right back.

"Well I was going to say that I thought that they had said that they had no pranks aimed towards the Slytherins this week, but a dare for you."

"Oh did they. And what was the dare Peter?"

Peter mumbled something incoherent.

"Speak up Peter; I can't hear you."

"I said that the dare was for you to look like the other girls."

"It was all Sirius's idea. He said that you were different from everyone else," said Remus.

"Thanks a lot Moony! How could you rat me out like that!"

"It was easy Padfoot. You see all I have to do is open my mouth and words come out."

"Moving on," I said. "I accept the dare. I'll dress up as 'one of the girls' this Saturday."

"You mean you're not mad?" asked Sirius.

"Of course not, but I should warn you to be on your toes this week."

"What do you mean 'be on your toes'? I'm not a ballerina."

"She means that you should watch out because she's going to be getting her revenge on us this week," explained Remus.

"Exactly! And in return I will perform the dare and not wear a simple T-shirt on Saturday. Tah- tah boys!"

I skipped away to the common room and ran into Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet, who were waiting for me.

"Why do you have an evil grin on your face Pinks?" asked Elizabeth.

"I'm thinking happy thoughts about pranking the Marauders this week with you guys to help me of course."

"And she's thinking about kissing Sirius too," teased Violet.

"Then I suppose Lily must think about kissing James 24/7 then, eh?"

"WHAT!! Charlotte you are sick!"

Heeheehee. All in a day's work.

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**A/N: I need some ideas for pranks Charlotte to play on the Maruaders, so can y'all help me??? Thanks!! 3 believeinmagic14**


	3. Prank 1

**Disclaimer: you know the drill-characters you reconize are not of my own mental creation but of j.k. rowling.**

**A/N: Thanks to Super Smexy Snuffles, Truth in the Moon, and joanthereloaded-92 for reviewing!!! Enjoy :)**

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Chapter 3- Prank 1

(No POV)

Charlotte woke up and stretched her arms out. She has explained to Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet about her pranks and they agreed to help. After all it wasn't every day that the Marauders got to go through a week of hell.

The first prank was the easiest so far. Lily and Charlotte had waited until James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter had gone to bed and then had sneaked up to the boys dormitories. Now they were all waiting in the Gryffindor common room for the boys to wake up.

"What a lovely pink room…PINK??!!"

"Aaaah the room is pink! Moony save us!"

"Who could have done this?"

"………"

"CHARLOTTE MCGRIFFEN GET YOUR BUTT UP HERE!"

The girls giggled at each other. So far so good.

Upstairs in the Boys Dormitories

James woke up from a lovely dream about Lily (for the umpth time!) He looked around the room and noticed the lovely shade of pink that the walls were.

"What a lovely pink room," he said. But then he wondered since when was the room pink? "Hold on here why is the room PINK??!!"

He went to go wake up Sirius to make sure that he wasn't seeing things. After all there was a legitimate reason why he was wearing glasses.

"What is i—Aaaah the room is pink! Moony save us!"

Remus and Peter woke up groggily to Sirius's shouts of despair. Sure enough the room was pink and not just any pink, but bright pink.

"Moony our room is pink as you have found out by Padfoot's announcement. Who could have done this?" said James gravely.

"Er, I dunno. A Slytherin out for revenge?"

The Peter spoke up. "Or what about a _girl_ out for revenge?"

"That's it Charlie! She was 'mad' at us and now this is one of her pranks!" said Remus.

"CHARLOTTE MCGRIFFEN GET YOUR BUTT UP HERE!" screamed Sirius.

The girls bounded up the stairs giggling. They looked at the boys faces. James looked dead serious, Sirius looked furious, Remus had a hint of a smile on his face, and Peter just looked even more confused then usual.

"You called Sirius?" said Charlie.

"What did you do to our room?"

"Oh, I thought it needed a little touching up. I mean gray is such a depressing color, while pink is such a happy color! Besides pink is my favorite color so I decide, why not right? So what do you think?"

"What do I think?! Charlie the Marauder's room is pink! And not just any pink, but bright pink as in the color of the streaks in your hair!"

"What's your point?"

"My point is that the Marauders' room cannot be pink! We are manly men and manly men don't have pink rooms!"

"I beg to differ. You still aren't manly men, therefore what you are saying would be a lie," interrupted Lily.

"Stay out of this Lily!" they shouted at her.

"Besides you haven't even noticed the lovely décor Sirius. I thought that you were more of an observationist!"

Sirius looked more carefully around the room and realized that he missed out on a few things. There were light pink ruffles on everything and then there was a pink stuffed unicorn in a corner. Instead of the usual littering of robes, etc there was a mess of pink robes that were a horrendous shade.

"Charlie! How could you do this to us?!"

"It was simple. All I had to do was have my wand and say a simple color-changing spell and voila!"

"That's not what I meant!"

"And what did you mean then?"

"I meant that this was plain mean Charlie! Never in a million years would I have thought that you would have played such a prank on us. And of all the colors of the rainbow you had to pick pink for Christ's sake!"

"Aren't you over exaggerating?! If you remember it's 'prank the Marauders week'! Would you have preferred a more masculine color, such as blue?! Well I thought that you would have liked a color that wasn't another house color!"

"But everything is so pink!"

"Awww, poor Sirius! Too ashamed to bring up your one-night stand girls with you? Well it would do you good if you didn't shag someone 24/7!"

"Hey my love life has no revelence to the current situation!"

"You mean the fabulous hookup life of Sirius Black? It has everything to do with it! It's the only logical reason for why you're so against pink! You don't see James, Remus, or Peter complaining!"

"Hey don't bring us into this!" shouted Peter.

Sirius and Charlotte ignored him and continue to argue. Finally everyone had become fed up with the pair and Violet jumped in.

"You guys stop! There's no reason to keep fighting over such a ridiculous thing as the color pink. We already have one fighting pair, yes I mean you Lily and James, and we don't need another! Now do you guys have anything to say to each other?"

"Yes, Black better watch his back otherwise I'm going to hit him where he least excepts it."

"And Charlotte better keep her mouth shut otherwise she's going to be very sorry!"

Violet groaned. Even though they weren't yelling, they were still sniping at each other.

"Okay let's try it my way. Lily, Elizabeth grab Charlotte's arms; we're going to breakfast now. James, Remus, and Peter calm make sure Sirius doesn't break anything. See you guys at breakfast, bye!" said Violet going down the stairs, with a fuming Charlotte behind her.

Great Hall, about 20 minutes later

(Lily's POV)

After what seemed like hours, the Marauders finally showed their faces at breakfast. James was tomato red, Sirius still looked pretty mad, Remus was a little pink (robes and all!), and Peter was looking around nervously. They tried to make a quiet entrance, but Charlotte ruined that for them! Today she stood atop the table instead of Sirius.

"Attention, attention! Can everyone please look towards the entrance to the Great Hall please? For those of you who are still half asleep you might find this awakening."

"Now why exactly do are the infamous Marauders looking like this you wonder? This week they planned a prank or rather dare that went to far, therefore this week the marauders themselves will be pranked! Yes, it's true, you heard me correctly; the Marauders are being pranked. Here is a sign courtesy of the NewMs!"

A sign popped out of nowhere and floated in the air for the whole school to see. Charlotte and I made it. It said:

_We Hope that You Like the PRANKS!_

_ENJOY!!!_

_ 3, the New Marauders_

_a.k.a._

_Pinks_

_Emerald_

_Girl Scout_

_Thunder_

_p.s. See we even have nicknames too!_

By the way Pinks is Charlotte, Girl Scout is Elizabeth, Thunder is Violet, and I'm Emerald. But Hogwarts didn't need to know that although they could probably figure it out anyways.

Sirius and Remus started to gape at the sign, Peter started to tear up (what a baby), and James glared daggers at the sign. Everyone, even the teachers, were laughing. (Actually the Slytherins were jeering and pointing, which made me feel kind of bad, but that feeling soon faded after I realized that the 1st prank was a success!) All of a sudden McGonagall swooped down upon the table.

"Miss Evans, Miss McGriffen, Miss Waldorf (Beth), and Miss Schmidt, is it true that you four pulled this prank?"

"Professor McGonagall, miss! I cannot tell a lie! It was I who came up with the idea!" said Charlotte.

McGonagall looked at her strangely.

"You're becoming more and more like Mr. Black every day Miss McGriffen (here Charlotte looked disgusted and Sirius started to laugh.) Anyways 10 points to Gryffindor for a prank well done." Then she gave us one of her rare smile.

"Minnie! How come you award them for pulling pranks, but you punish us when we pull pranks?!" asked Sirius.

"Well Mr. Black, Mr. Potter, Mr. Lupin, Mr. Pettigrew and you are usually trying to cause a ruckus when you display your pranks. I daresay that whatever you did you probably deserve whatever Miss Evans, Miss McGriffen, Miss Waldorf, and Miss Schmidt have in store for you. By the way here are your schedules for this year." She finished handing them out and continued passing them out to the rest of the Gryffindors.

"Lily- flower, do we share any classes together?" asked James.

I looked at his schedule and groaned.

"Unfortunately all of them. How did it happen that we're both taking the exact same classes? And don't call me Lily- flower!"

"Similar interests, perhaps?"

"Ha! I have more in common with the Giant Squid then you!"

James frowned in thought.

"Well, you both are pretty stubborn, dearest, but otherwise I'm not seeing the similarities…"

"Potter, if you don't shut up right now I swear I'll---"

"What kiss me?" he asked hopefully.

"In your dreams."

"But that's only one of them honey. Do you want to make them all come true? We can start with dream #1: Want to go to Hogsmeade with me?"

"Not in a million years and no, I don't want to know what your other dreams are!"

How dare he! You would think that after 3 years he would get the picture and move on. But nooo, not James. He's just too damned determined! I glared at him and went to finish my breakfast. However I found that I wasn't hungry anymore. Damned Potter made me lose my appetite! Grrrr!

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**A/N: So what do you think of the first prank?? I still need an idea for one more prank, so pleaseee review!**


	4. Quidditch Tryouts equals Fights

**Disclaimer: This storyline is of my own creation. Sadly, however, any ideas that you do reconize are not of my own creation.**

**A/N: Thanks to marauders rox and Truth in the Moon for reviewing!!! This chapter has nothing to do with the pranks, but is a important chapter nonetheless. Enjoy!**

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Chapter 4- Quidditch TryoutsFights

No POV)

James posted a sign on the Gryffindor message board. It read:

_Attention all Gryffindors_

_2nd years and up_

_Quidditch Tryouts Tonight_

_6:30 pm on Quidditch pitch_

_Open positions are _**chaser**_ and _**keeper**

_Captain James Potter_

Sirius came up to James and looked at the sign.

"It won't be the same without Dale (old keeper) and Vanessa (old Chaser) this year," he commented.

"Yeah, but we'll have to move on without them. I'm determined to win the Cup again this year. That's why we need to find someone who works as well as Vanessa did with you and Charlie and someone who block almost anything." James replied.

"Well I think that the best chaser wouldn't be because of skill, but would be chosen because they can put up with Charlie and me. We've had another fight and it's only 3 in the afternoon. It's a freakin' world record!"

"What was the fight about?"

"Oh it was about the pranking week she has planned for us. I still don't understand why she would do this! And the name? The NewMs? A total rip-off of our name, the Marauders. It's like she's trying to be us only the girl versions. See Lily is Remus; they're both really smart and stickler for safety and rules…well lily more than Remus obviously. Violet is you to a tee; especially when it comes to pushing Lily's buttons to the limit. Elizabeth is Peter, only she's not as shy or afraid as Peter is. And Charlotte has to be me because we're both chasers and you head McGonagall this morning: Miss Mcgriffen you're the next Mr. Black," mimed Sirius.

"Padfoot, do you like Charlie in that other way?"

"Of course not! We're just friends. Why do you think that Prongs?"

"Because if you were like Remus, Peter, and I then you would find this whole thing amusing and laugh it off. Instead you're standing there ranting about how Charlie is so wrong on all accounts. It seems clear to me that you like her."

Sirius's face drained of color.

"I repeat, I do not like Charlie! We're just friends and nothing more. Don't look at me like that Prongs, it's the truth---oh look over there it's Lily!" said Sirius. "Hi LILY!"

Lily turned around to see who was calling her name. When she saw Sirius waving wildly and James staring at her she scowled. She was tired of seeing James's face everywhere she went. Although this might have to with the fact that they had every class on the planet together, but that's beside the point. If only he would leave her alone, she thought, then she would be the happiest girl on the earth.

Quidditch Field

(James's POV)

"Okay everyone. I'm James Potter and I'm captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team. Welcome to tryouts. As it said on the sign we're looking for a new chaser and keeper because those two players graduated last year. For the chaser position I will be looking to see how well you fly and how well you get along with our other two chasers, Charlotte McGriffen and Sirius Black."

A small boy with brown hair and blue eyes raised his hand timidly.

"Yes, Gregory?"

"Er, don't you mean how well Black and McGriffen get along with each other?"

"What the hell are you talking about?"

Another boy named Will Patil spoke up.

"What Greg means is to look behind you Potter. Black and McGriffen look like they're going to tear each other's heads off!"

I turned around. Sure enough Sirius and Charlotte were definitely fighting. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but it was quite obvious; Sirius was flinging his arms about and Charlotte was making rude hand gestures at him. Violet, on the other hand, was trying to calm them both down. I flew over to where they were and listened to their argument. Surprisingly it wasn't about the pranking week .

'Honestly Black I don't know why the entire female population of Hogwarts like you! You're an insufferable toe rag who doesn't even know what a haircut is!"

"Well at least I have girls chasing after me! Any boy who likes you it too afraid to approach you because you're a fricken tomboy!"

"Just because I don't someone new to shag every night doesn't mean that boys don't like me! You have like a new flavor of the week 24/7. What is it Black, feel like you need to prove something?"

"You're just jealous! You want to know what you are?! An evil bitch!"

I saw Charlie stiffen, but instead of bursting into tears, like most girls, she got a blazing look in her eyes and continued to throw back retorts at Sirius. I looked at Violet.

"Okay how did this start? They were fine in the changing rooms." I said.

"They were, but then they started arguing about the pranks again which lead to Charlotte saying that Sirius didn't like the pranks because he was afraid that girls wouldn't like him because he would look weak getting pranked. That lead to Sirius saying that that he wasn't afraid and eventually lead to what you are currently watching." Violet responded.

"This is not good for team spirit. All the people who are here to try out keep wondering what they're doing up here. They----"

I was interrupted by Charlotte, whose eyes were blazing with fury.

"Violet, lend me your bat."

"Sorry, no. You're in no position to be holding a bat."

"Fine. Oh Daniel! Be a good friend and lend me your bat!"

Daniel, the other Beater, flew over and gave Charlotte his bat. She got this malicious glint in her eyes, gripped the bat in her hands, and started to whack Sirius over the head with it.

"You whack prat! WhackNever whack call me that whack again! Whack"

"Ouch! Charlie, okay, okay I'm sorry! Can you stop hitting me over the head with a Beater's bat now?!"

"No! Whack You better whack watch out whack this whack week! You're going to whack get it! Whack You thought whack that this whack morning was bad? Whack Then you whack haven't seen whack nothing yet!!! Whack"

While Charlotte was hitting Sirius over the head, I looked down at the crowd of Gryffindors who were waiting to try out. They were looking straight at Charlotte and Sirius and were laughing at the pair. A couple of people were even rolling on the ground laughing…literally. That's when I knew that I had to do something.

"Charlotte! Sirius! Stop fighting right now! Charlie give Daniel back his bat. Then I want you both to apologize to each other. On this field, we're a team, got it? Whatever happens off the field stays off the field. And if you both don't agree with this then you're off the team. Now we have tryouts to get on with."

I flew back down and hoped that they would take my words to heart. We didn't need their bickering to ruin Gryffindor's chances of winning the Cup.

"Okay, people, we're going to start with Keeper tryouts. Sirius and Charlotte will each throw 7 Quaffles at the goal posts. Whoever saves the most out of 14 shots is our new keeper. First up is Jake Diller, 4th year."

After about 45 minutes of tryouts I had found a new keeper. His name was Nathaniel Hunter, a 5th year who had saved 13 shots. Next were Chaser tryouts. Sirius and Charlotte had calmed down a considerable amount, but every once in a while Sirius would glare at Charlotte, while she stared icily into space.

"For the people trying out for Chaser, you'll be tested on your passing skills, fly skills, and communication skills. Let's start with Zack Wilson, 2nd year."

We were up to a 5th year named Sierra Callahan when things started to get nasty between Sirius and Charlotte again. Sirius had caught the Quaffle and instead of passing it to Charlotte, he had thrown it right over the hoops, opposite of where Charlotte was.

"Black! Pay attention why don't you?!" screamed Charlotte.

"I can't help it! It was probably just a case of bad luck!" Sirius screamed back.

"Or maybe it was because you were to busying ogling Sierra's _assets_ to pay attention to your throwing! Moving on to 6th years already? Just shameful Black."

"That was low McGriffen. Taking lessons from Lily are we? Well two can play at that game. Where's your boyfriend, hunh? Oh that's right you don't have one and you never will! You are the complete opposite of anything that a boy wants! When boys look at you, they don't see a girl they see someone who plays too many sports. They see someone who is dirt ugly and doesn't act like a 'girl'!"

By now everyone except for Violet, Lily, Elizabeth, and I had fled. (Lily and Elizabeth were in the stands.) Violet had gasped and I'm pretty sure that I was gaping as well. Charlotte's hand flew to her mouth and she stared at Sirius. Sirius seemed to realize what he said, only he was seconds too late.

"Oh shit. Charlie I'm so sorry. God I don't know why I said that. I guess I was just so frustrated. I'm so sorry. Charlie say something."

"Then I'm afraid that you never should have had anything come out of your mouth in the first place. If you think so many negative things about me then maybe we shouldn't be friends anymore."

"No Charlie I really didn't mean any of it. Any guy would be lucky to have you. Honest Charlie, really."

"I guess…I'll see you tomorrow Black." As Charlotte said this, a tear slowly leaked from her eye. She turned around and flew down to Lily and Elizabeth.

"Good going Sirius," hissed Violet. "You know that that's one of her biggest nerves. That's also only the 2nd time she's ever cried and the first time you were the cause of that too. Remember, you told her that Bradley was cheating on her and she burst into tears? You know that boys are a sore spot for her!"

"I know, I know. I'm really sorry about it. What can I do to earn her forgiveness?"

"I don't know if she'll ever want to be your friend after those hurtful things you just said too you. However if you really insist then you should ask James. I'm sure he can think of something. Right now I have a friend to help and pranks don't do themselves you know." Violet flew down to her friends after that.

Sirius turned to me.

"Any ideas Prongs? Charlie 's my best friend, save you, Moony, and Wormtail."

"Hmmm…I got it! I'll tell you all about it on the way back to the castle," I responded.

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**A/N: So what do you think? what do you think James's big idea is?? I still need an idea for the 3rd prank so please review!**


	5. Prank 2, Remus Helps Out, and Vi's POV

**A/N: Thanks to marauders rox, Artemis' Hunt, Truth in the Moon, and i love fred and George for reviewing. Also thanks to Supet Smexy Snuffles for the idea for prank 2!! Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I do not, and will never own anything associated with harry potter, except for the things in my story that don't come from harry potter.**

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Chapter 5-Prank 2 and Remus Helps Out plus a little bit of Violet's thoughts

Great Hall

(No POV)

The NewMs had set up the second prank perfectly although it had taken longer to plan out. This time it would especially embarrass Sirius because of Sirus and Charlotte's fight. Needless to say Lily was steaming mad when she found out and charlotte was feeling glum. After all her and Sirius had been friend ever since they had run into each other in second year…

_Flashback_

_Charlotte was walking into the Great Hall, alone. She knew that Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet would have heart attacks if they knew that she had snuck out in the middle of the night. She headed towards the Slytherin's table and bumped into something or someone in the dark._

"_Who's there? Show your self," she said. Then she heard someone whisper, "Lumos," and someone stepped out of the shadows. _

"_It's just me, Sirius Orion Black at your service. Charlotte what are you doing here??"_

"_What does it look like? I'm playing a prank on the Slytherins duh!"_

"_But you're a friend of Lily Evans!"_

"_Uh, yeah, so?"_

"_Isn't she a stickler for rules though?"_

"_Exactly; that's why she's not standing here with me!"_

"_Oh."_

"_Why are you here Sirius?"_

"_I thought that my lovely younger brother needed a well-deserved prank."_

"_Well, so where are your partners-in-crime? Aren't they usually co mischief makers?"_

"_James is writing a letter, Remus is in bed, and Peter was in the bathroom last time I checked. So that leaves me all alone by myself." Sirius flashed her a grin that already made him popular among the other girls in their year. "Since you're here would you like to join me?"_

"_Why not? What do I have to lose?"_

"_That's the spirit!"_

"_Great; what have I gotten my self into," muttered Charlotte._

"_What was that?"_

"_Nothing Sirius."_

_After the pair had put the necessary spells on the Slytherin's area Sirius said, "Thanks for helping me Miss Charlotte. It was greatly appreciated."_

"_It was my pleasure Mr. Sirius."_

_They smiled at each other and left the Great Hall._

_End Flashback_

Sirius and she had laughed for days over that one. That was the first of pranks they pulled together too. Charlotte wished that she had never had the fight yesterday with Sirius. Then they could go back to being best buddies. Sigh, a girl can only wish.

Boy's Dormitories

(Sirius's POV)

I was in big trouble. Or at least that was the tamer version that Remus gave me. The hardcore version was that I was dense, selfish, ignorant, rude, and stubborn courtesy of violet. Either way I still need to redeem my self!

I ran my hand through my hair…err hold on a second…I ran my hand through my hair…that wasn't there? I ran (literally!) to the bathroom. And what I saw was horrifying! Absolutely terrifying!

My beautiful, beautiful black hair was gone! This had to be some sort of illusion! However it unfortunately wasn't. Now who could have done this...I know! Probably some Slytherin who's jealous of my devishly handsome good looks. (I'm one of the few that are that blessed!) It makes perfect sense.

I went to James's bed and woke him up Sirius style of course (includes bonking of head, tweak on the nose and jumping on bed Warning do not try at home!)

"Ow, what do you want Sirius?"

"I have no hair."

"Very funny Padfoot. No one starts losing their hair at 17. Now let me go back to bed; it isn't time for breakfast yet."

"No really. I'm bald."

"And really I'm tired so let me sleep."

"I'm serious!"

"I know you are. You use that pun about 20 times a day."

"No not I'm Sirius. I'm serious, as in literally telling truth."

"Look, Padfoot, if this is some kind of prank to get me to open my eyes it's not working. So go away and let me sleep."

"But Prongs, I really am bald. Why don't you just look?"

"Fine, but if you're not telling the truth you're a dead man."

James opened his eyes and looked at me…and he just stared and stared and stared.

"Hey, you were right! You are bald!"

"Told you so," I said and stuck out my tongue at him. "I know who did it too."

"Amuse me. Who made you bald?"

"Some jealous Slytherin of course. It makes perfect sense. After all not everyone has dashing good looks."

"Er, I don't think that a Slytherin did that."

'Nuh-uh! What are you talking about? It's the only reasonable explanation!"

"Think Padfoot. Who currently hates you?"

"I think the question should be who currently loves me? The correct answer would be everyone!!"

James groaned and shook his head.

"Let's try this again. Who did you have a major fight with yesterday?"

"Oh that's easy; Charlie."

"Good. Now who's pranking the Marauders this week?"

"Charlie."

"Yes and who might be out for special revenge on you because of the two prior questions?"

James waited for me to answer. He was not making any sense equaling to me being very confused. What did Charlotte have to do with my new baldness?...Wait, hold a second…

"Charlie did it!" I shouted.

"Took you long enough," said James smirking.

"Shut up Prongs. I wonder how long this spell lasts for…I hope that it's only 24 hours or something."

"Knowing how upset she was last night I'm suspecting that it's going to last a couple of days at the least."

"A couple of _days_?! Nooooo! It'll ruin my hottie control!! How devastating!"

"Padfoot, stop acting like a girl. It's not the end of the world."

However I didn't listen to James and continued to groan and moan about my tragic mishap (very tragic indeed!) for a good 20 minutes. Meanwhile James had chuckled a book at me and proceeded to go back to bed. Well I would be able to ignore me and go back to bed if my hair was fine instead of lost!

Back to Great Hall

(No POV)

Sirius ended up being late for breakfast (surprise, surprise.) On his head was a giant, knit, Gryffindor hat that covered more than half of his head. He went to go sit with James, Remus, Lily, Charlotte, Elizabeth, and Violet, but as he made his way through the tables, Lily pointed her wand at his hat and it flew off. Complete, absolute silence. Then Violet screamed, "Gosh Sirius way to make a statement! You look so weird!" Everyone chuckled at that. Violet took this as her cue to continue.

"Anyways the NewMs would like to tell everyone that this is indeed part of prank 2 in case you were too asleep to figure it out. So Sirius is sporting the new hairstyle this season: chrome-top. He has decided to pair this with a pair of scruffy shoes, pink pants, a pink robe, a pink-collared shirt, and to complete it all off a pink tie! What do you think about this Elizabeth?"

Elizabeth played along.

"Well, Violet, although Sirius is definitely sporting an 'in' look for this fall, he's trying too hard to pull off a somewhat girly look. However I must offer my congratulations to Sirius; a girly look isn't normally an 'in' look for pranksters. Back to you Vi."

"Thanks Beth. So what exactly is in and what's out? Well baldness and the color hot pink appear to be in. Long, shaggy hair and black are now out. Notice how Sirius rocks a pink robe, pink pants, pink tie, with a white button down shirt, and black shoes. Take careful note of his newfound 'no hair'. Classic, yet with a twist. WE call this the "Prankster Look"."

"Exactly Violet. The "Prankster look" is sweeping London off its feet. So boys break out the razors and your manly pink shirts. Ladies, no arm is fully complete without one of these arm candies hanging off of it. This is Elizabeth and Violet bringing your weekly fashion report."

Sirius ignored all of the laughter and made his way to where his friends were sitting. He found that there were now new seating arrangements with Charlotte sitting the farthest away she could as possible without excluding the others. Sirius tried to look Charlotte in the eye, but she pointedly ignored him and continued to laugh with Violet, lily, and Elizabeth. This was going to be a long day…

Gryffindor Common Room, after classes

(No POV)

The 4 girls sat down on a rug in the common room and started to chat.

"So Charlotte, you know how you want to humiliate Sirius especially because of the things he said to you?" asked Elizabeth.

"What about it, Beth?"

"Well I was talking to Remus and he said that he had an idea."

"Why would he help us out? After all he is a friend of Black."

"It's so obvious Charlotte!" exclaimed Violet. "Everyone knows that what Sirius said was rater mean and definitely uncalled for. Remus probably thinks that Sirius deserves some well-played pranks on him. Right Elizabeth?"

"Yeah. Hey there's Remus now! Remus over here!" called Elizabeth.

Remus turned around and saw Elizabeth beckoning him over to where the other girls sat. He felt his heart flutter at the sight of shy Elizabeth waving her arms around to get his attention. If only he could gather up the courage to tell her about his 'furry little problem' as the other Marauders donned it. After all they had been dating for almost a year now. However he put those thoughts out of his head and walked over.

"Hey Elizabeth. What's up?" asked Remus.

"Tell Charlotte about your idea. Remember, the one that will make Sirius wide-eyed and shocked?"

"Oh yeah, but if he asks I didn't help you guys; I was doing homework. Okay so Charlotte, we all know that Sirius's weakness is girls, right? And you know how you have to dress up on Saturday? Well this idea will probably make him grovel at your feet."

"So what's the idea already?" asked Charlotte, impatiently.

"Right, right. The idea is for you to dress up not only on Saturday, but also on Sunday and Monday. The second part if of the idea is for Lily, Elizabeth, and violet to join you. You see once he gets over the shock of you dressed up in one outfit you hit him with another."

Lily spoke up.

"So far the idea seems okay, but how will we convince Dumbledore to let us 'dress up' on Monday? We have to wear our uniform. I think this prank week might seem too trivial for him to let us not wear our uniforms."

"I already talked to Dumbledore about it Lily. He said, or rather McGonagall said, that is' okay as long we don't turn this place into an opium house. And don't ask where she got that from."

"Well, I know that Charlotte and I are in. What about you guys, violet and Elizabeth?"

"It seems like it's for a good cause, so okay I'm in," said violet.

"Me too!" chimed in Elizabeth.

"Now remember Remus, this is a surprise so don't even tell James or Peter," said Charlotte.

"Okay, okay, I'm glad to be of service. I'll see you guys at dinner."

With that Remus left, after of course, kissing Elizabeth goodbye. Gosh Elizabeth thought. She could stare at him for hours. He was a dream come true. Even after a year she still couldn't believe that she was dating such a great guy. But even with this great connection between them, Elizabeth couldn't help but feel that Remus was hiding something from her. She decide not to ponder on it for too long though; they had a great relationship and she didn't want to ruin it.

Great Hall, dinner

(Violet's thoughts)

I cannot believe it! Sirius Black is such a fin b! The things he said were so rude and inconsiderate; I'm surprised that Charlotte didn't kill him. I know I would've.

The nerve of Sirius He walks around like he owns the place (and James as well!) and when Elizabeth and I did our little commentary this morning, he didn't even flinch. Then the whole day during classes he kept looking over at Charlotte, but point for point she shot daggers at him. Honestly, it reminded me of back in 3rd and beginning of 4th year when James would keep desperately asking Lily out. **(A/N: See Chapter 1 if you don't know why.)**

But even I can see how different they are without each other; so can Elizabeth and Lily. Sirius kept cracking weak smiles and his eyes were showing flashes of regret. Charlotte became really serious and was in a permanent bad mood (and when she's in a bad mood, she's in a bad mood!) If you ask me, I think that they're exactly each other, only Sirius has that whole Y chromosome going on. Either that or they're very moody, as in they're up, they're down, never in-between.

Speaking of the devil, here comes Mr. Black now. He grudgingly takes a seat next to James evil smirk immediately he leaps back up, with a shout. Witness the wicked power of hot coal. (Charlotte and Lily performed some charm to change the coal into a type of semi-hot paint and painted his part of the bench so that he would feel the burn of fury Charlotte wished to unleash on him.) Sirius started jumping around. The paint had not only stuck to the seat of his pants, but was apparently still burning hot. Yes! Part 1 and 2 have both been very successful. Let's see if part 3 works…yes, yes keep hopping…no move to the right Sirius…Whoosh. Sirius just stepped on a trigger that Elizabeth and I set up. When he activated it some Muggle device called a fire igniter turned on, leading to complete chaos. He continued to hop around even more, with his pants starting to look a little charred. Everyone was laughing. I mean, just the sight of bald Sirius wearing hot pink clothes was funny enough, but add liquid coal and fire and you got a sideshow attraction!

"Help! Someone help me! My pants are on fire, my pants are on fire!" Sirius screamed.

And then Charlotte spoke to him for the first time that day.

"You want the fire out then the fire out it should be," Charlotte said with a malicious look in her eyes.

She stood up, walked over to Sirius, took the pitcher of lemonade and poured it all over him. Then she proceeded to take a pie off the table and put it in his face. Score! Every single person was astonished because that was so un-Charlotte like. But then Lily and Elizabeth started to laugh and there went off the Great Hall again. Even James, Remus, and Peter were snickering at their best mate! Maybe we, the NewMs, should become "certified" pranksters like the Marauders, only Lily probably wouldn't like that…

Sirius Black you better watch out! When the NewMs are down with you, you'll be nothing b ut a quivering 7th year.

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**A/N: So far this had been my longest chapter. I fooled around a little bit with Violet's thought. What did y'all think about Violet's thoughts?Should i keep them or what? Also this is your last chance if you have an idea for the 3rd prank, so please leave ideas. Review!!**


	6. Intermission:Things Go Bump in the Night

**A/N: Hey y'all! This is just a filler chapter because I'm having a little bit of a writer's block, so it's really short. I hope you like it! And thanks to maruaders rox, Truth in the Moon, and Artemis' Hunt for reviewing!!!**

**Dislaimer: Okay, if you're not getting the picture by now then i feel horribly sorry for you.**

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Behind the Scenes- Things go Bump in the Night

Boys Dormitory

(No POV)

"Shhh…remember we have to be quiet to pull this off," whispered Charlotte.

The others nodded and followed her into the boys' dormitory. Carefully, they maneuvered themselves around piles upon piles of junk. Not only was it messy, but it was smelly. Violet's face curled up in disgust.

"This place is a pig pen! How the hell do they live in here?" she asked.

"Easy, Vi; they're lazy 17 year old boys. All they care about is Quidditch, Newts, and whether they can get a good shag. They don't have time in those busy schedules for a little overdue spring cleaning," answered Charlotte.

Violet, Lily, and Elizabeth gave each other a look. This was not like Charlotte at all. Usually it was the girls who would complain about the boys and Charlotte who would stand up for them. But instead of saying something that might incur her wrath, they busied themselves with the tasks Charlotte had assigned them. They had just finished when all of a sudden Lily screamed out in pain.

The girls froze in fear or being caught. Lily had stepped on a thumbtack and was biting her lip really hard to stop from screaming again. One of the boys stirred and sat up. Charlotte held her breath and quickly motioned for the other girls to sneak out of the still open door. They obliged and ran for it.

As the boy got closer Charlotte groaned inwardly. It was Sirius. Hmm, she thought. Distraction, distraction…

bump

"Who's there?" asked Sirius. "_Lumos._"

"Charlotte? Why are you here at 2 in the morning? I thought you were one of those things that go bump in the night."

"Only you would think that Black. By the way, they're called bogeymen."

"Ohhhhh. Hey! Stop trying to change the subject!"

"I wasn't trying to change the subject! I was merely telling you the name of the creatures that go bump in the night!"

"Wonderful, just what I needed; a fight at 2 in the morning! Well I don't think that anyone else needs to hear this so _Silencio_!"

"Now who's changing the subject?"

"Yeah whatever. So where're your partners in crime, Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet?"

"Er…Lily is sleeping, Elizabeth is sleeping, and look at that Violet happens to be sleeping too."

"Hmm…I don't believe you, but I'll let it slide."

Awkward silence.

"Charlie?"

"Yes Black? What do you want now? Another chance to insult me? Well go ahead here's your chance."

"Look Charlie I'm sorry. I know I messed up and I want us to be friends again."

"I don't know if that's possible. Some of the things you said were pretty ugly."

"Yeah well your comments were no walk in the park either!"

"Then how come everybody is sympathizing with me and not you?"

"I don't know."

"Look Black it doesn't work this way! You can't insult me one moment and then expect that I'll welcome you back with open arms. Forgiveness comes with a price. You deserve everything that the NewMs are pulling and more. Even afterwards I don't know if we can be friends again. Yeah, I may have said some unwelcome things to you, but what you said was more then just a pissy, in the moment kind of insult! It was rude, hurtful, disappointing, disrespectful, sha----"

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**A/N: Mwahaha. don't you wish you knew what happened. don't worry you'll find out next chapter, i just thought i'll leave a little clifhanger to spice things up. so what do you think happened?? also when should you, the readers, think that Charlotte and Sirius should make up? I'm thinking that right now she's still pissed at him, but if you want them to make up within the next week then okay. tell me what you think cause your thoughts count:)**


	7. Prank 3

**A/N: Thanks to waitingforjudgement, Truth in the Moon, marauders rox, and Artemis' Hunt for reviewing!! Finally the last prank phew! i hope that you like it :)**

**Disclaimer: Well, i think it's a bit obvious by now...**

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Chapter 6-Prank 3

Girls' Dormitories

(Lily's POV)

I swear charlotte will be the death of me. First off she's sneaking into the boys' dormitories to pull revenge on Sirius. What if she gets caught? Second, she makes us come with her to complete the pranks. Third, if Charlotte hadn't forced us, okay me, into going then I wouldn't have stepped on that bloody tack and then I wouldn't have screamed. That means that charlotte wouldn't have taken the blame for us. I hope the boys didn't report her or anything…

Actually come to think of it Charlotte wasn't fuming mad when she came back last night. (Which she would have been if she had gotten a detention.) Her cheeks were bright red and when we asked her what was wrong she mumbled something incoherent. Hmm, now I want to know what happened!

Last night was so tiring! It had to be one of the most intricately complex set of spells that we had to pull all week. But it wasn't just spells either; we had to use physical work because we had to maneuver between all of the boys' junk. No wonder the marauders look a little tired whenever they pull a prank. Wait, did I just show sympathy towards the marauders? This cannot be happening! Let's see… "No wonder the marauders look a little tired". Yep definitely pity. Aaah! I, Lily Evans, does not, I repeat does not show sympathy towards the Marauders. No, nada, zilch!

Boys' Dormitories

(No POV)

Meanwhile in the boys' dormitories Sirius was running around screaming fire. (Don't worry there really wasn't a fire.) Unfortunately James, Remus, and Peter were ignoring his cries of fire. They had learned that after years of sharing a dorm with Sirius, that if you ignored him, then he'll eventually shut up. This, however, was not the case. Peter popped his head out of his blankets and called to Sirius.

"Padfoot, is it an emergency? Is there rally a fire?"

"No, but--"

"Then why are you screaming fire?"

"Because a terrible thing has happened and I'm trying to get your attention!"

"So there's no fire? No emergency?"

"Well there's no fire, but I consider the result of this prank and emergency! They---"

"If it's the result of a prank then I feel no pity for you. Shut up and let us sleep."

And with that Peter crawled back under his bed covers. Sirius started to pout, but to no avail. So he sat on his bed and contemplated about what had happened last night.

_Flashback_

"_Oww!"_

_Sirius rubbed his eyes and sat up. He had distinctly heard someone scream in pain. Well he wasn't going to sit there without investigating. He got up and started walking towards the source of the sound._

_bump_

"_Who's there? _Lumos_," he said._

"_Charlotte? Why are you here at 2 in the morning? I thought you were one of those things that go bump in the night."_

"_Only you would think that Black. By the way they're called bogeymen."_

"_Ohhhhh. Hey! Stop trying to change the subject!"_

"_I wasn't trying to change the subject! I was merely telling you the name of the creatures that go bump in the night!"_

"_Wonderful, just what I needed; a fight at 2 in the morning! Well I don't think that anyone else needs to hear this so _Silencio_!" _

"_Now's who changing the subject?" Charlotte smirked at him._

"_Yeah whatever. So where're your partners in crime, Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet?"_

"_Er…Lily is sleeping, Elizabeth is sleeping, and look at that Violet happens to be sleeping too." _

"_Hmm…I don't believe you, but I'll let it slide."_

_Awkward silence._

"_Charlie?"_

"_Yes Black? What do you want now? Another chance to insult me? Well go ahead here's your chance."_

"_Look Charlie I'm sorry. I know I messed up and I want us to be friends again."_

"_I don't know if that's possible. Some of the things you said were pretty ugly."_

"_Yeah well your comments were no walk in the park either!" _

"_Then how come everybody is sympathizing with me and not you?"_

"_I don't know."_

"_Look Black it doesn't work this way! You can't insult me one moment and then expect that I'll welcome you back with open arms. Forgiveness comes with a price. You deserve everything that the NewMs are pulling and more. Even afterwards I don't know if we can be friends again. Yeah, I may have said some unwelcome things to you, but what you said was more then just a pissy, in the moment kind of insult! It was rude, hurtful, disappointing, disrespectful, sha----"_

_Sirius didn't want to listen to Charlotte list off all of the things he did wrong, so he did the only thing he could think of to shut her up; he leaned in and kissed her. Instinctively his hands went to her waist pulling her closer. They stood there kissing for a couple of minutes, but then all of a sudden Charlotte pushed away and look at him._

"_Why the hell did you do that for?" she asked finally._

"_I don't know. I guess I wasn't thinking straight."_

"_Damn right you weren't! Look this never happened! You will not tell 'Prongs', 'Moony' or 'Wormtail' about this, understood? If I hear one peep about this from anyone, then your already dead ass is a goner!"_

_Charlotte turned and ran out of the room, without another look behind. Sirius touched his tingling lips. That was merely a diversion kiss right, he thought. But if it was then why is my head reeling? Sirius shook out of his daze and went back to bed. He hoped that this fight would resolve with Charlotte, and fast._

_End Flashback_

"Holy Crud! Moony look!"

"What is it Prongs?"

"Look on Padfoot's bed! It's some mutated animal!"

"That's ridiculous. I know that Sirius looks disgusting when he hasn't had his morning shower, but mutated animal is a little extreme."

"No really! It looks like a cross between a chicken and a crow. But yet it has Padfoot's eyes and facial features. It's even wearing Sirius's pajamas!"

Sirius glared at them.

"Aaah Moony! It's glaring at me!"

"Prongs I'm warning you," growled Sirius.

"Moony it knows my name!"

"Arrgh! Prongs _I'm _Padfoot! This is why I was screaming fire this morning! To get your attention! This has to be a product of one of the girls' pranks! Wait why aren't the rest of you sprouting feathers?"

"Hmmm, let's see. _You_, not _us_ came up with Charlotte's dare. You, not us insulted Charlotte and made her mad. _You_, not _us_ proceeded to aggravate the already aggravated NewMs. _You_, not _us_---"

"Okay, okay I get the picture Moony. So I understand why you and Wormtail may not be recipients, but what about Prongs? He annoys Evans for a good 3-4 years, yet he still looks normal.

"I don't annoy Lily. I just merely try to get her to realize that the two of us are mean to be. Every time she says no just means that she's falling in love with me."

Remus and Sirius gave James a look.

"Fine I annoy her."

"Back to the main problem though! I look like a bird! I cannot face my fans like this!"

Then Peter spoke up.

"You said the same thing yesterday when you were bald, yet you managed. You made fun of Snivellus, ate a lot, and was even able to fit in a snog session with Lauren Tamory, that brunette Ravenclaw.

James started laughing and Remus smiled at the comment. Sirius glared at the three of them.

"Some friends you three are! So I can make it through the day. But I really don't want to give them the satisfaction that their prank was well-played."

"I think that your screaming may have already given it away Padfoot. You have to admit that those 3 pranks were actually pretty funny."

"Prongs, I'm astonished! They've brainwashed you into thinking that these are good pranks!"

James, Remus, and Peter looked at each other and started laughing again.

Great Hall, Breakfast

The Marauders walked into the Great Hall. Sirius was a sight! His clothes were still hot pink, only now there were feathers everywhere except for his feet and face. As soon as they sat down, a sign popped down from the ceiling.

_Aw, who let the little birdie out of its cage?_

_This is the last prank, so enjoy it while it lasts!_

_BTW, bring sunglasses tomorrow; you'll need them _

_3, the NewMs_

_Pinks_

_Emerald_

_Girl Scout_

_Thunder _

"Hey Elizabeth!" whispered Lily.

"What?"

"Is it me or are Charlotte and Sirius avoiding each other more then usual? Like now they're not even sneaking glances at each other?"

"Oh my god, yeah you're right! That's so weird. I bet it has to do with why she took 15 minutes getting back from the boys' dorms."

While Lily and Elizabeth talked about Charlotte, Charlotte was looking down at her plate thinking about what happened.

_Flashback_

"_Charlie?"_

"_Yes Black? What do you want now? Another chance to insult me? Well go ahead here's your chance."_

"_Look Charlie I'm sorry. I know I messed up and I want us to be friends again."_

"_I don't know if that's possible. Some of the things you said were pretty ugly."_

"_Yeah well your comments were no walk in the park either!" _

"_Then how come everybody is sympathizing with me and not you?"_

"_I don't know."_

"_Look Black it doesn't work this way! You can't insult me one moment and then expect that I'll welcome you back with open arms. Forgiveness comes with a price. You deserve everything that the NewMs are pulling and more. Even afterwards I don't know if we can be friends again. Yeah, I may have said some unwelcome things to you, but what you said was more then just a pissy, in the moment kind of insult! It was rude, hurtful, disappointing, disrespectful, sha----"_

_Charlotte was cut off as she found a pair of lips on her own. Sirius was kissing her! His hands moved to her waist, deepening the kiss. _

_Her arms were about to snake around his neck when she realized what she was doing and pushed him away. For a moment they just stared at each other._

"_Why the hell did you do that for?" Charlotte asked finally._

"_I don't know. I guess I wasn't thinking straight."_

"_Damn right you weren't! Look this never happened! You will not tell 'Prongs', 'Moony' or 'Wormtail' about this, understood? If I hear one peep about this from anyone, then your already dead ass is a goner!"_

_Charlotte whirled around and flew out the door, down the stairs. As she went out of the door she could feel Sirius's eyes poring into her back. Charlotte collapsed on one of the couches and touched a hand to her throbbing lips. That felt more then just any kiss…it was special. If only, she thought, if only she wasn't mad at Sirius. Then they never would have kissed and she never would have been so confused._

_End Flashback_

"Violet, can you pass the strawberry jam?"

"But Charlotte it's closer to Sirius. I know that you two are fighting, but this is ridiculous. You guys seriously aren't that angry are you?"

Sirius and Charlotte ignored her and Charlotte asked for the jam again. Reluctantly, Violet handed it to her. This is crazy. They better make up before my birthday! She thought. But then again, knowing them it'll take ages to make up because they always hold grudges to heart. Violet turned to James.

"James we have a major Quidditch problem."

"What do you mean Violet?"

"Just look at Sirius and Charlotte. They're giving each other the silent treatment. Personally I like it better when they're verbally battling it out."

"Me too, but what does this have to do with Quidditch?"

"Okay, so they're both Chasers; that means that they have to work together. However how do you expect them to work together if they can't even perform simple tasks such as passing jam to each other? You saw what happened at tryouts and that was when they were being loud and annoying. Add in the new 3rd chaser, who has to learn to get along with these two, and we've made ourselves a catastrophe.

"Oh, I see what you mean. Hopefully they'll make up before the first match of the season. Maybe we should write a book for our new chaser entitled How to Avoid Sirius and Charlotte.

"Yeah, that would be funny. The poor guy's face will turn ash white as soon as he see's the title. Watch how he'll somehow end up in the hospital wing every single practice."

"Haha that's probably true. Just make sure that charlotte doesn't get a hold of any beater's bats and we'll be golden."

"And if we're lucky they'll make up before this millennium is over."

Throughout the day Sirius received many snickers and 'bird' calls at his new, er, ensemble. However after one glare from Sirius, said 'bird' callers and laughers would immediately stop, not wanting to become the result of a hex or worse, a prank.

The girls however were receiving many high-fives and congratulations. Whenever they passed the Marauders several looks were exchanged: Sirius and Charlotte looked at each other with no clear emotion on their faces, and then they would look away. James winked at Lily and lily glared back in return. Remus and Elizabeth smiled at each other (aren't they the happy couple…) Violet looked bored and Peter was oblivious to the NewMs. Then within a matter of seconds they would all pretend that they hadn't noticed each other, except for Charlotte and Sirius because they were already doing that, and well Violet and Peter because they hadn't noticed each other in the first place.

What a life, what a life.

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**A/N: So yeah, who was expecting _that _to happen between Charlotte and Sirius? It just kind of came out when i was writing it. Also, this may seem a little selfish, but i won't be updating the next chapter, which is where Charlotte gets all dressed up, unless i get at least 5 reviews for this chapter or just 5 more reviews in general. So click on the little grey button down below and start typing lol. **


	8. OMG, is that CharlotteVictoriaMcGriffen?

**A/N: Thanks to emuroo, Artemis's Hunt, marauders rox, BlackCharmer, Truth in the Moon, and Viagirl for reviewing :) Sorry that this has taken so long to update. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I hereby announceth that anything you reconize from the famously knoweth harry potter series is not mineth.**

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Chapter 7- OMG, is that Charlotte Victoria McGriffen?!

Girls Dormitories

(Charlotte's POV)

"Rise and shine Charlotte!"

I woke up and tried to focus my eyes.

"Elizabeth? Is that you? Why are you waking me up at 7 in the morning if breakfast isn't until 7:45?"

"simple; you need to get ready for Day 1 of the 'Dressing as a Killer Babe' plan that we got from Remus."

"But I want to sleep! I can get ready in like 5 minutes flat."

"Too bad. Look Lily and Violet are up as well."

I put my pillow over my head and stifled a groan. After 10 minutes of whining, fussing, and 2 buckets of water, I got out of bed. Lily, Elizabeth, and violet were rifling through their closets for stuff to wear.

"Charlotte, do you want to borrow something from one of us?" asked Violet. "It's not like you have girly clothes anyways."

I replied with a mischievous smile, "Actually I beg to differ. My mom, being the debutante she is, buys me bunches of clothes that she thinks and 18 year old girl should wear. However, I never wear them so those clothes stay in that big trunk over there."

I went over to the trunk and opened it. Inside were clothes of different colors, materials, and sizes. There were shoes, makeup, and accessories. Basically things that other girls are obsessed with. I rifled through it, found what I was looking for, and went into the bathroom. I put on a pink, lacy tank top, denim shorts, and black converse sneakers. My hair was straight and you could clearly see the pink streaks in it. I also lined my eyes with a rose colored kohl pencil and put on a sheer lip gloss. I stepped out of the bathroom. Lily, Elizabeth, and violet were waiting for me and as soon as they saw me they stared at me in shock.

Lily was wearing a white halter top, a khaki knee-length skirt, and gold ballerina shoes that laced up to mid calf. Her hair was slightly wavy and she wore brown mascara to bring out her eyes. Elizabeth wore a blue spaghetti strap top, a brown bubble skirt, and brown cowboy boots. She had curled he hair into ringlets that framed her face and had sparkly eyelids. Violet wore a pale lilac, corset-like top, black Bermuda shorts, and dark purple Pumas. Her hair was clipped back with a butterfly pin and she wore her signature red lipstick and black eyeliner.

"Oh my god! I can't believe it's you!" exclaimed Lily.

"Charlotte Victoria McGriffen, you have boobs!" said Elizabeth. "You are definitely going to blow everybody away!"

"And best of all Sirius will be drooling over you," said Violet with a wink.

I glared and threw a pillow at her. She caught it in one hand and stuck her tongue out at me. I retaliated by sticking my tongue out at her too. I know so mature for a bunch of young adults.

"Hey if Black wants to 'drool' over me then that's his problem, not mine. Just as long as no one takes a picture and shows it to my mother, I might actually survive this dreadful weekend. Mum would just glance at the picture and say, 'Finally Charlotte's growing up.' Puh-lease! Just because I don't wear what she wants me to wear doesn't mean that I'm immature."

"Are you sure about that Pinks?" teased Lily. "You act pretty immature to me! After all you're the only one out of the 4 of us who wears jerseys and look where that's gotten you; a prank war!"

I stuck my tongue out at her and scowled.

"Haha Emerie; you're a hoot. So who wants to make sure that no one sees us on the way to breakfast?"

Lily, Elizabeth, and I looked at Violet.

"Uh-oh. Why are you three looking at me with hopeful eyes? I'm completely innocent here!"

"Yeah, but you're the only one who normally wears makeup and tanktops," replied Lily.

Great Hall, Breakfast

(Sirius's POV)

"But Prongs, we all know that-----"

I cut my sentence short and stared at the sight behind James's head; it was Charlotte, Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet. They looked hot! Especially Charlotte…I think I just saw a flash of her bragulp…James turned around to see what I was looking at. His jaw literally dropped when he saw Lily. Remus's eyes bugged out when he saw Elizabeth. And Peter…well Peter was too busy sleeping with his head in his bowl of cereal.

The NewMs started walking towards the Gryffindor table. A lot of people started whispering about Charlotte. Others started wolf-whistling and called out their names. (Well, no one called out Elizabeth's name because they all knew that she was Remus's girlfriend.) They stopped in front of James, Remus, Peter, and I. They smiled sweetly, a little too sweetly.

"Potter, sweetie, didn't your mother ever tell you that it's not nice to stare at people? And by the way, an open mouth is most unattractive," said lily as she leaned over and closed James's mouth, her voice laced with sugar.

"You know Black, you should take a picture; it lasts longer," said Charlotte.

I snapped out of my daze and looked at her again. Her mouth was in a smirk and her eyes wee missing their usual twinkle. Instead her eyes were a dull blue, with ice radiating off of them.

"Are you deaf or something? Cause you're still staring," said Violet.

"Of course not," I scoffed. 'I am the Great Sirius Black. Someone with that magnitude of greatness is not hearing impaired."

"Yeah if he was a magician," muttered Lily.

I gave her an imitation of the "Lily Evans" glare, but she just rolled her eyes. I continued with what I was saying.

'Some say that I'm great at athletics; others might say academics; but I find that most people say that I'm great in bed."

James, Remus, lily, Charlotte, Elizabeth, and Violet looked at me with disgust. What? I can't help it if I'm that talented. I mean not everybody can produce that type of love; only I can.

"TMI, Sirius, TMI. When will you learn to control yourself?" asked Remus.

I wonder what he means by that. I know exactly when to control myself. Especially when it come down to pranking Snivellus (only 10 times a week—I know such control.) There's also when I decide if I should choke James or not because he's moping around after Lily has rejected him again. Although Lily probably has the whole murdering James thing down pat…

Midday, Hogwarts Quad

(No POV)

It was time for Charlotte's football games (American football.) She always held them whenever there weren't Quidditch games/ practices, claiming that the sport kept you in shape all year round. Normally to get people to play Charlotte would tease the boys by saying that they were chicken and she would badger the girls by telling them to stand up for girls around the world. Sure enough people would give in and play.

Charlotte had changed into a tight jersey and regular sneaker to play, but kept the jersey snug in accordance to the dare. She waved to Lily, Elizabeth, and violet; all three had decided not to play no matter how much she begged them. They waved back and smiled.

They were almost done with the game (Charlotte's team was winning) when someone tackled Charlotte. She looked up into the grinning face of Sirius Black and immediately scowled. Meanwhile Sirius was having other thoughts, such as how pretty Charlotte looked even though she was scowling and he noticed how her jersey had ridden up exposing her flat stomach from all the sports she did. Snap out of it, Sirius thought to himself. You can't possibly like Charlotte like _that._

'Black, you aren't the lightest person in the world; feel free to get off me any time, not," said Charlotte.

Sirius regained his regular thought process and rolled over to the side of her. Charlotte got up and noticed people staring at her. After flipping them off she announced that the game was over and went to talk to Lily, Elizabeth, and Violet. The 4 of them had been talking for awhile when they heard a voice behind them.

"Well, well, well if it isn't Miss Half-blood, Miss Know It All, Little Miss sunshine, and Miss Slut.

They turned around and came face to face with Melissa snider, resident bitch, and her groupies. Melissa, more commonly known as Mel to her friends, was a 7th year Hufflepuff. She had light brown hair with blond highlights and dark brown eyes that always glinted evilly unlike Elizabeth's soft brown eyes. She especially like being mean to Lily and Charlotte for 3 reasons:

Melissa had two huge crushes on Sirius and James. However everyone knew that James was infatuated with Lily and that Sirius hated Melissa because she was mean to Charlotte.

Charlotte had the 'in' spot with the Marauders that she desperately wanted.

Lily was too smart for a muggle.

"Why hello _Mel_. What brings you and your posse to this neck of the woods?"

"I was watching you little, ah, football fame as you ruffians call it. Sirius was so hot out there, I was sweating bullets,' responded Melissa, flipping her hair over her shoulder.

"Puh-lease! Black may be stupid, but he's not stupid enough to date you. He goes for girls with class, not trash."

Violet started to cough/laugh, but Melissa glared at her, so she stopped.

"You never know Charlotte, darling," said Melissa. "Now that you're on the outside track with the Marauders, they need a new girl to fill your shoes, namely me. Once Sirius gets a whiff of the new me, he'll be mine within seconds."

"So you mean instead of being a bitch and a total loser, you're now a whore and a teen queen wannabee? Wow I'm seeing the improvement already."

"You're just jealous because you 'secretly' like Sirius and you know that you two will never be together."

Charlotte's face registered a look of shock and disgust.

"Excuse me? What did you just say?"

"You heard me."

"Damn right I did. I could care less about whom Sirius's current snog-buddy is. I'm only protecting his best interests. Take you for example; I highly doubt that Sirius wants Harrison's sloppy leftovers, but hey he doesn't have to listen to me."

"Whatever, I'm done here. Buh-bye Miss Half-blood."

Melissa flipped her hair again and brushed by the NewMs. One of the groupies tried to push Elizabeth onto the ground, but Lily caught Elizabeth. The NewMs started to walk back to Gryffindor common room, but then someone stepped out from the shadows and clamped their hands on Lily's mouth stifling her screams.

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**A/N: Heh-heh-heh. another cliffhanger. Please review :)**


	9. Fights and Friends?

**A/N Sorry that I've taken so long to update!! Thanks to emuroo, Artemis' Hunt, Brazilian Princess, bubbles-munchkin, iluvreading, and PadfootStripQuidditch for reviewing!! enjoy this chapter!! 3**

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Chapter 8- Fights and Friends?

"Aaaaah! Someb-mmph! Mmn-mmph!"

Lily couldn't breathe…or at least not through her mouth.

"C'mon Lily, be quiet. Someone will hear you!" whispered someone as soon as Violet, Charlotte, and Elizabeth had turned the corner.

Lily's eyebrows shot up. She knew that voice! It was definitely a student from Hogwarts and it couldn't be a Slytherin because they hadn't hexed her yet. She calmed down and the person took her to an empty class room. The person let go of her and she turned around to find…

"JAMES HENRY POTTER!! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?"

James winced and said, 'Calm down Lily. I'm not going to hurt you; I just wanted to, er, talk."

'Right because the last time I checked, kidnapping someone was exactly the right way to talk to tem!"

"That's not fair! You don't let me talk to you! All you do I yell at me. I try to talk to you and you just turn around and shout curses at me! Why can't you give me a second chance?"

"Because I can't! You're too immature and we already went out remember? But because of you being you, you couldn't even stop pulling pranks for the last 2 weeks of school!"

"I've already told you! That wasn't me!"

"Of course it wasn't you; you just happened to be the only person in the entire school who knew that spell perfectly!"

_Flashback_

_Lily was the happiest girl in the world or pretty close to it. Why? Because she was going out with James Potter who was one of the hottest boys in school. In fact Lily was still surprised that James was showing interest in her, seeing as she was a muggle. Now if he could only stop pulling pranks save graduation day then that would prove the he really liked her. _

_She went up the girls dormitories and sat on her bed. She started humming and Violet, Elizabeth and charlotte turned around to look at her and gaped._

"_Hi Lily. Um, so how are you today?" asked Charlotte._

"_What kind of question is that? Isn't it obvious that I'm in a really good mood?" said Lily._

"_Oh."_

_Lily gave Charlotte a weird look. Then Violet jumped in._

"_Lily have you happened to look in a mirror between 6__th__ period and now?"_

"_No, why?"_

"_Just look in the mirror," said Elizabeth gently. _

_Puzzled, lily got up and looked in the mirror…sand stared. Her hair was purple and her skin was green with orange polka dots. After a couple of minutes Lily opened her mouth and let out an ear-splitting scream._

_James was dreaming contently by the fireplace. He still couldn't believe that he was going out with Lily Evans who in his opinion, was the prettiest girl in school. Of course that meant that he couldn't pull pranks until graduation , but he was already planning something with his fellow Marauders for graduation._

_All of a sudden James heard an ear-piercing shriek in the directions from the girls' dormitories that sounded a lot like Lily. Soon enough Lily came storming down the stairs, seething. _

"_JAMES HENRY POTTER! We need to talk!"_

"_Okay, Lily dear," said James, taking in Lily's appearance. "What happened you love?"_

"_That's what I need to talk to you about! Did you pull this prank?"_

"_No Lily, I swear that I didn't!" _

"_Funny because I distinctly remember you performing the spell on the Slytherins a couple of days ago and according to Sirius, Remus, and Peter you're the only one who can perfect that spell! But if you didn't do it then who did?!"_

"_Well in a couple of days someone could have perfected that spell!" said James, throwing his hands in the air. "Besides I don't know who did it! All I know is that it wasn't me!"_

_(More arguing)_

"_I cannot believe this!" screamed Lily. "If there's anyone I hate more then a promise breaker, it would be a liar! You have the nerve to lie right to my face like that! That's it James we're over!" _

_The common room gasped and James gaped at her. Lily turned and stormed to the girls' dormitories where charlotte, Elizabeth, and Violet were waiting for her._

_End Flashback_

Lily stood there with tears in her eyes. James just stood there, a bit shell-shocked and said,

"I'm sorry Lily. But what do you want me to do? Pretend that I did something I didn't do? Because if I did then I would be lying."

"Oh shut it Potter. You can't just admit that you pulled that damn prank!"

"Right because last time I checked, people lied about telling the truth! Nevertheless, that was a good 3-4 years ago! Why is that still bothering you?"

"You want to know why?!" asked Lily, her eyes flashing.

James nodded, daring her to speak.

"Fine! That day you broke my heart. You promised that you wouldn't pull a prank , but then you turned right around and pranked your own girlfriend! And that's just reason #1. #2 is that you couldn't even fess up. #3 is that it hadn't even been 24 hours, when I found you snogging some Hufflepuff, which is a new low for you."

"Did you honestly think that I wouldn't find out? Anytime you ask me out I just freak and immediately hate you for what you've done. I loved you! And look I still might love you, but I can't give you another chance because you can't keep any bloody promises."

James POV

Oh shit. I stared wordlessly at her. I could not believe what she sjust said. She basically just admitted that she loved me. And even though I reciprocated those feelings for some reason I couldn't grasp those words and all I could do was stare at her. I never knew that she felt that way, honestly I didn't. If I had known earlier then I would've fixed this. Which is why I had to start fixing it now.

"Lily is there anything I can do"

"Potter if you still love me then I want you to stop asking me out and stop trying to impress me. Go ask out some nice girl, just not me. Then we can just get on with our lives and me friends."

I sighed.

"Okay Lily; we'll just be friends because you want that. But incase you ever change your mind, just know that'll I'll always love you. Now let's go back to the common room. If you want we can pretend that this never happened."

Lily nodded her head and stuck out her hand.

"Friends?" she asked.

"Yes, friends," I replied and we walked back to the common room.

It would be hard for me to pretend that we were just friends. But it helped somewhere deep inside to know that I might have a miniscule chance with Lily.

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**A/NSo how was that? I don't think that it was the best chapter ever only because I started it, then had a bit of writer's block, and finished it. I'm just glad that i got this chapter over with :) Please review!!**


	10. Normal sort of

**A/N: Ah, sorry I haven't updated in the longest time..it's been like months. But now I have the next two chapters ready on my computer so don't go anywhere. Thank you to IhaveaRANDOMsister, marauders rox, Artemis Hunt, MWPPxxPwns, and BrazilianPrincess for reviewing!**

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Chapter 9- Normal...Sort Of

(No POV)

The next few days went by pretty quickly. Charlotte's dare was a success. Not only did she prove her point that she knew how to dress like a "girl", she had enough offers for dates to last her until the end of the year, once again proving another one of Sirius's points wrong. Sirius wasn't "horribly disfigured" anymore and the Marauders'' robes and room weren't pink anymore.

However the good ol' gossip mill was still running; everyone was talking about how James and Lily were actually being civil to each other and how they were actually acting like friends. While everybody was happy that that they weren't going to become deaf because of their fighting, they now had another bickering duo on their hands: Charlotte and Sirius.

They had taken to fighting at Quidditch practice, at meal times, in class, at the Hospital wing because they had hexed each other, in the library, in the common room, and according to one unlucky second-year, they even fought in the detentions that they had gotten for disrupting class and hexing each other. A joke was that Charlotte and Sirius fought more in one day then James and Lily ever did in one year! It eventually got so bad one day that a normally calm Elizabeth chucked several books at them, told them to shut up and suck up, and stormed out of Potions class. After that their bickering went down to somewhat better one or two fights a day; yes it was that bad. The only reason that nobody suspended them was because what they fought about was so ridiculous that there was really no good reason to.

(Gryffindor Common Room)

Violet came in and slammed her book bag on the floor. James, Remus, Peter, Lily, and Elizabeth looked up, startled. Violet had this wild look in her eyes that made it look like she wanted to strangle something…or worse two certain some bodies.

"I have had it up to here with them!" Violet shouted.

"Who's them?" asked Peter.

The entire common room shouted, "Sirius and Charlotte!" at him. Peter looked offended for a second and was about to reply when he caught Violet looking at him and he shut up.

"I'm going to pretend that you didn't ask that Peter," said Violet. "So I'm walking back from the library when I hear loud voices around the corner. Apparently they are still standing where we left them 2 hours ago! They were practicing their new hobby. Guess what it is?"

"Um, standing together?" asked Peter looking innocent.

"Everyone looked at him exasperated.

"Wormtail, it was a rhetorical question; but just so you know their new hobby is arguing," said James.

"Well now their arguments have taken an all-new weird level," said Violet. "Guess what they were arguing about?"

"Er, makeup?" commented Peter.

"No Peter; what did we say about answering rhetorical…wait actually that's correct Peter." Violet looked amazed.

"What's so weird about that?" asked James. "I mean if it was anyone else I would be worried, but this is Sirius and Charlotte. They've both worn makeup before."

"Oh no that's not what I thought was weird. It was the fact that they were arguing about which color eye shadow look good on Remus; that was the disturbing part."

"WHAT?!" screamed Remus. The others looked incredulously at Violet, and then started laughing.

"Remus is there something you're not telling me?" teased Elizabeth. "I thought you would have told your girlfriend everything!"

"That's not funny," said Remus, who had turned red. "They can't think of a better subject for their makeup woes."

"Honestly, who cares? Those two are getting on my last nerves," said James.

"I think that Beth proved that last week in class," joked Lily.

Elizabeth turned red, to match Remus. For awhile the 6 of them just sat there talking and having a good time. All of a sudden Lily started squealing.

"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!"

"What is it Emerie?" asked Elizabeth. Lily beckoned for Elizabeth to come closer. Then she whispered something in her ear and they both turned to look at Violet.

"No way Lily, we couldn't have!"

"But we did, we really did!"

"But we had a plan and everything!"

"I know! That's why I don't know how we could have possibly forgotten!"

They rushed towards Violet and gave her a hug, saying, "Oh Vi! We're so very sorry! We have to go find Charlotte!" They jumped up and ran out of the common room. James, Remus, and Peter looked at Violet.

"Whoa! Do not look at me that way!" said Violet. "I have no idea why they're all whatever!"

A couple of minutes later, the girls came back in, whispering excitedly, while Sirius trailed in not too long after them, looking really confused.

"Are you sure that we forgot?" asked Charlotte.

"Positive!" said Lily and Elizabeth.

"Aw man we're the worst friends ever!" said Charlotte. Then she turned to Violet and said, "Violet I am so, so sorry! Do you forgive us?"

"Well," said Violet, smiling slightly. "I can't quite forget you if you don't tell me what you're sorry for."

"That brings up a good point. What are you three talking about?" asked James.

"It's Violet's birthday today James!" said Elizabeth.

"Hmmm…so it is. Wow. I'm eighteen today…" murmured Violet.

The Marauders turned to look at Violet with fake hurt on their faces.

"Violet! It's your birthday and you didn't tell us?" asked James.

"Yeah I thought that we were friends!" said Sirius.

"Wait we were friends Black?" said Violet. "That's news to me…but seriously it's just a birthday, it's not that important."

"Not important? Violet, you're talking to James and Sirius, the two guys who think that birthdays should be considered holidays," said Remus.

"You know what I think? I think that Violet forgot her own birthday!" said Charlotte.

Violet scoffed.

"No I didn't! I so did not forget my own birthday. It's just isn't that important, especially since I'm not a muggle, therefore I became an adult last year."

"Muggle, pure-blood, whatever. A birthday is a birthday and don't you try and mess with our heads Violet Rebecca-Lynn Schmidt!" said Lily. "Now we're going to get your birthday presents so don't try and run away."

In a flash Lily, Charlotte, and Elizabeth had rushed up the stairs and back down each bearing an elaborately wrapped present. They gave the presents to Violet and after much urging from the girls and the Marauders to open them, Violet reached for Lily's present. Lily had gotten her two t-shirts, Elizabeth had gotten her a charm bracelet, and Charlotte had gotten her a certificate to a muggle shoe outlet. Then they handed her one more present; it also had an envelope attached to it. Inside the package was a pair of drumsticks. They were black with red zigzags on them and glitter on it. Violet gave an uncharacteristic squeal.

"Ah! These are fabulous! Were did you did you find them?!" said Violet. Then her eyes lit up. "Does that mean that the you know what is in the envelope?"

The three girls nodded. Violet squealed again.

"That means I can get what Charlotte got, only a different design of course!" said Violet.

"I think we missed something here…" said Peter.

"Yeah, what's in that envelope?" asked Remus.

"And when did you start playing the drums?" asked Sirius.

"And what does my cousin have that you don't have?" asked James.

The girls smirked at each other.

"I don't know, should we tell them?" asked Violet.

"Nah; they'll just mess things up," said Charlotte.

"Not to mention that you're looking at one of the school's biggest gossip rats…" said Elizabeth. They turned to look at Sirius and he tried to look offended.

"I do not gossip! I merely talk about interesting news!" said Sirius.

"Okay then. Who told everybody that Erica was really a blonde?" said Lily.

"And who told everybody that Aidan was gay?" said Charlotte.

"And who told everybody that we hated worms?" said Violet.

"Admit it Sirius, you so gossip! You gossip more then the 4 of us combined and we're girls!" said Elizabeth.

Sirius pouted.

"Moony, your girlfriend's mean!" Remus just smiled at that, while Elizabeth continued to smirk.

"Well, Sirius," said Elizabeth. "A Marauder's girlfriend, especially one who's a NewM, has to not only be pretty and nice, but be able to insult Sirius Black."

"Moony your girlfriend hates me!"

"And that's why I'm going out with her Padfoot," said Remus.

They all laughed, while Sirius glared at them. Elizabeth gave Remus a kiss on the cheek. Eventually Sirius joined in with the laughter.

"You know Violet, we feel so bad that we, the Marauders didn't get you anything for your birthday," said James.

"I think that means we'll have to do something special tomorrow. What do you think Moony? Wormtail?" asked Sirius.

"Wait right there!" said Violet. "What do you mean by something special? Really you don't have to do anything!"

"No we insist! Now goodbye ladies and Charlie (Charlotte scowls) we have work to do!" said Sirius.

The boys went up to their dormitories to plan their special gift, while Violet put her head in her arms muttering obscenities under her breath.

"Well on the plus side, they forgot about the envelope!" said Lily. Violet just gave her a look.

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**A/N: Heh, more cliff-hangers, but they'll be solved all in due time. Now I think by now you should all know that I'm aiming to get Charlotte and Sirius together. I have a couple ideas for that, but I'd love your opinion;; how do you think they should get together? Be creative!**


	11. To Violet from Marauders

**A/N: I know, I didn't give anyone time to review, but I felt like making up for lost updates...so here's the next chapter for you guys. Enjoy!**

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Chapter 10: To Violet, love the Marauders

Violet was still really suspicious the next morning when she woke up. She quirked an eyebrow when the Marauders greeted Lily, Charlotte, Elizabeth, and herself with all too innocent smiles. She became more suspicious and quirked the other eyebrow when Sirius and Charlotte made no comments to each other during breakfast, not that anyone was complaining. However her suspicions finally were confirmed when the Marauders stood up and pulled 4 megaphones out from underneath the table.

"Attention students, faculty, ghosts, and dare I say Slytherins. We recently acquired information that yesterday was a certain NewMs 18th birthday," said Sirius gesturing towards Violet.

"And we felt so bad that we didn't get her anything that we just had to make it up to her," said James.

"The one thing that this NewM loves more then Quidditch is music," said Peter.

"Therefore we decided that the appropriate thing to do was to have a song sang for her," said Remus.

"Actually the appropriate thing to do would be to be quiet and sit down," muttered Violet.

"So professor is we may?" asked Remus.

The teachers looked at them warily and nodded their heads. James pulled out a baton and a podium. Then Sirius forced several students up in front of the podium; they all happened to be Slytherins, one of which included Snape. They protested adamantly, but to no avail. They would've hexed Sirius, but even they were smart enough not to hex anyone in front of Dumbledore.

"You guys will like this song. It's called 'Do You Believe in the Magic'. Lily recommended it," said Sirius.

Lily stood up and gave Sirius a glare.

"I did no such thing Black! And if you're insinuating that I thought up this crack-pot scheme of yours, I'm right over here and I can hear everything you're saying," said Lily. "Now stop talking about me or I'll feed you to the Giant Squid!"

"Yes, you would know all about what the Giant Squid likes to eat, wouldn't you?" commented Peter. "After all I believe that you've said that you would rather date the Giant Squid then go out with James."

Students started to laugh at this comment. Elizabeth and Violet rolled their eyes, Lily gave Peter a steely glare, and Charlotte made some comment about how Peter could remember this, but he couldn't pass Transfiguration.

"Just. Stop. Talking. About. Me," said Lily, through clenched teeth.

Sirius whimpered.

"Yes sir! I mean madam…I mean Lily!" said Sirius, in his poor attempt to try and avoid the upcoming glare that was to ensue.

""Moving on," said James pointedly towards Sirius. "Don't worry about the lyrics; why you'll find that you already know them."

"And if I were you I wouldn't resist it; otherwise there'll be some nasty consequences…do a one and a two and a…" said Remus.

James started to wave the baton around. Most of the Slytherins, sensing there really would be nasty consequences opened their mouths and the words started to pour out. However there were those slim picking of them who kept their mouths shut.

_Poof_

A puff of smoke surrounded the Slytherins who had refused to sing. When the smoke cleared, they looked at each other in horror. They were now sporting complete Gryffindor attire, from hats to simply the colors of their robes. Grudgingly, they opened their mouths and started to sing as well.

It sounded…awful. Well to Violet's ears it sounded like a several dying animals. She grimaced and covered her ears. She looked to see the other's reactions. Lily looked like she regretted playing that song in the common room and would never want to listen to that song ever again; Elizabeth was trying to contain giggles and Charlotte looked like she wanted to join in on the prank. Okay so it was kind of funny in a twisted sort of way. Violet had to give the Marauders props for attempting this.

For the big finale, James held out his arms while Sirius, Remus, and Peter pretended to sing along. Silence followed. Now would be her cue. Violet marched over and gave each Marauder a peck on the cheek.

"Oh god, thanks guys. How long did it take you to come up with that? All of five minutes?" teased Violet, good-naturedly. "I have to admit that it was funny, although I think you just scarred that song for life. Now gets those idiots out of our house colors; they're ruining the colors."

They waved their wands and the Gryffindor attire disappeared. With several mutterings about certain hexes the Slytherins made their way back to their seats, but not without giving Violet very dark looks. She was very tempted to flip them off, but c'mon the professors were sitting right there and she wasn't that transparent.

"Thank you for using one of my favorite songs as a prank," said Lily sarcastically when they sat down to finish their breakfast. "And to think I was worried that you might call off the whole thing."

"Ignore her, she's obviously can't see the underlying humor in it all," said Elizabeth, laughing.

The Marauders smiled and Sirius sought out one person's comments in particular. But there was no comment from that certain person. Who was that person? Charlotte. As soon as the boy and Violet had returned Charlotte and resumed her steely glare. Sirius shook his head and turned to James.

"Prongs, buddy, tell your cousin that glares do not befit her," said Sirius.

Charlotte overheard this and turned their way.

"James, tell your best friend that I will glare at nothing in particular if I bloody feel like it," said Charlotte, now directing her glare at Sirius.

(James's POV)

I groaned as Charlotte and Sirius started to argue, this time non-directly. Why do I have to get the brunt of it all? Sirus expects me to side with him because we're best friends and practically brothers. Which normally I would side with him…that is if he was in an argument with anybody else. See Charlotte and I, we're cousins (through our mothers) and even though she's a year older then me we're pretty close.

See this is where it starts to get difficult.

If I side with Sirius…well I'd never hear the end of it from lovely Aunt Helena (Charlotte's mother.) Really she's a nice woman, but when it comes down to defending her daughter, then you can start to see where Charlotte get's her attitude from. And then her sister Celine, my mother, will get mad at me because I "turned against family." So then I might as well just save myself the trouble and side with Charlotte then, right? Wrong. Because if I side with Charlotte, the other guys will not let me live it down that I prefer my cousin to them. The whole thing is just one ugly mess.

Personally I'd rather not side with either of them, simply because this whole charade is completely and utterly ridiculous. I have this feeling that both of them have forgotten why they're mad at each other and are only arguing just to save face. But that's just my opinion and Remus claims that my opinions are never very good to begin with.

"Hold it right there. Since when did I become the in-between between your arguments? I do not remember agreeing to this!" I said, crossing my arms and breaking the chain that had become to form.

"Would you prefer that we argued normally?" asked Charlotte, her voice dripping with a mix of sweetness and sarcasm. "I mean we could probably get along worse without you in the way…"

She trailed off on purpose and raised an eyebrow at me, as if daring me to rebel against her. I started to backtrack.

"Heh-heh I didn't know what I was talking about obviously. Was I complaining? I mean I'm perfectly fine being the in-between," I said.

"That's what I thought. Now tell Black that if he doesn't get off my back he'll wish he had never known me," said Charlotte.

I muttered an explicit word under my breath and relayed the message back to Sirius. He got the idea and shut up.

I felt a tap on my shoulder. Turning my head slightly I saw Elizabeth.

"You shouldn't let them bully you like that," she said in that quiet way of hers. She tugged on a strand of her brown hair. "After all you're the headboy."

"I appreciate the thought Beth, but we both know that would help anything. Remember last time? They got way to quiet and instead stuck with glaring and almost lead to a fist-fight," I responded. "For some reason it gives me an odd comfort to hear their voices; then I know that one didn't kill the other."

I smiled hoping that Elizabeth would catch the joke. Though the fact that at points of the day they looked like they were ready to kill the other was a bit unnerving.

"True, it wouldn't help. But some authority might not hurt either," she said. She must have seen the expression of disbelief on my face because she continued on. "Look, I'm just saying that they're both looking at you to play a factor in this. Maybe you just need to step in and tell them that you want nothing to do with this whole fight. Then they might just realize how ridiculous the whole thing is and become friends again. Try it, it might work."

Elizabeth wiped her mouth and got up. She gave me a smile full of pity.

"C'mon guys we have to get to class," said Elizabeth to Lily, Violet, and Charlotte.

They left the Great Hall and us guys were left to listen to some more of Sirius's ranting. I kind of looked at Elizabeth's retreating figure in surprise. Out of the seven years that I had known Elizabeth that had to have been the most she had ever said to me. Actually that had to be the most I had ever heard her say to anybody. Most of time she stuck to one-liners and laughing. So if she was talking like that…then the whole situation must be pretty bad.

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**A/N: The first prank by the Marauders...wasn't up to the usual par, but hope it was okay. Review please and thank you.**


	12. Please and Thank You

**A/N: Thanks to Truth in the Moon, buttonbit, IhaveaRANDOMsister, Artemis Hunt, shetlandlace, and scribbles.pooksta for reviewing! It was good to know that people still read this story even though I take horribly long times to update.**

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Chapter 11 Please and Thank You

That humorous morning seemed to be the highlight of the week. After that, everybody seemed to get irritated, although it wasn't all because of Sirius and Charlotte, who were naturally angry at each other. Remus was losing sleep since the full moon was coming up, and Violet was too busy snapping at little first years over how loud they were being in the common room. Not to mention that James, Lily, and all the prefects were running on little sleep and high tensions due to the imminent arrival of the Halloween Ball. The Ball was happening at the end of October, obviously, but because there was still so much to do, so little time. The biggest surprise came when Elizabeth, mild-headed Elizabeth, threw a book at Peter for stepping on the handle of her book bag. Yikes.

_(Lily's POV)_

It was a nice day out, but somehow myself and all of the other Prefects plus James, had ended up in the regular meeting place going over more details. I felt like tearing my hair out. We had less than four weeks left, and we hadn't agreed on anything except for that it would be a costume ball. That was it. We still had more to plan…what band should we get, if it's a costume ball should there be a theme, etcetera. Gah!

"I still think that we shouldn't hire the Bad Wolves. Their funds are outrageous and their lyrics are rather inappropriate for here," said Talen Ruthgard, a sixth year from Hufflepuff.

"Yeah, but they're the hottest band in the central London area! All the other bands haven't even had half of their success," shot back Karla Mathos, a fifth year from Slytherin.

I threw up my hands in despair. This was going nowhere…and it was quickly nearing seven pm. Guess what happens at seven? The meeting ends, and we don't meet again until a week and a half from now. Oh joy. From across the room I could tell that James was getting irritated too. He had this look on his face, his angry face. See how his eyes crinkle at the corners, and how his shoulders are really tense…oh my god. What's happening to me? Lately I've been able to tell his different reactions from the other, and I've been smiling more whenever I've been around him.

Could this be because we're friends? It had to be. I mean Charlotte was usually smiling around him and could tell when he was lying…then again they were cousins and she had known him for close to eighteen years. I however had mastered that skill within weeks.

Quickly jolting up from my seat, I was shaken out of my thoughts, by James finally standing up, this exasperate look to his face.

"Look it's 6:45 and we're getting nowhere with this. How about you all write down your ideas on a sheet of paper and leave them on the coffee table on your way out? Then Lily and I will look them over and make our decisions," said James.

The prefects nodded their agreement and all reached for sheets of paper from their bags. I raised an eyebrow in surprise. It had been awhile since I had heard the nice peace and quiet of quill on paper. And James had made that happen. Wow. After a few minutes all of the prefects left the pieces of paper on the table and walked out, right on that dot at seven pm.

"Thanks James, I owe you," I said smiling at him.

"Hey it was no problem. You were probably just as pissed off as I was. So let's see what we got here, then?" said James, smiling back at me. He picked up the stack of paper and handed half to me.

"You know I like this idea…have the theme be a masque costume ball. You can wear any costume you want, but you have to add a masque to it," I said after some silence.

"Going with that, this person said thinks that the costume ball should have a specific theme like from a time period or something," said James.

"That's too restricting though, a time period. But…there could be a theme to the decorations."

"How about a woods theme? We could move a tree from the greenhouse to the Great Hall and the tables would look really cool."

"That's actually…that's a really good idea. But we'd have to say that this means your costume doesn't have to correlate."

"Good point…so what about music?"

"Well Talen makes a good point…the Bad Wolves are rather pricey. So I was thinking that we could hire a less expensive, perhaps less popular band, but then have room for another band."

"What other band are you thinking? Unless we hire two horrible bands then we can't afford two bands."

"Look, do you trust my taste?"

"Yeah," said James, leaning back in his chair.

"Then trust me. I know a fairly good band that works cheap…they're new on the music scene and have been waiting for an opportunity like this. You can take care of the other band," I replied, smiling sweetly.

"Hm…" said James, giving me this look. "Fine. But if the students don't like that other band, it was all you."

"Fine, I don't mind taking the heat because there won't be any," I shot back.

James had the audacity to laugh. I suppose it was a little funny, seeing as we were friends now. I laughed too.

"So now that those things are all covered, what are you doing this weekend? Poring over your books?" said James, his voice in a teasing manner.

"Haha, Potter. No I'm actually going to be getting some air this weekend, by going on the Hogsmeade trip with Beth and Violet. We're getting costumes."

"Uh-uh. Count Elizabeth out. She's going on a date with Remus, and something tells me she isn't breaking it. Why don't you just take along Charlotte?"

"Because she's too busy trailing Sirius."

"Pardon?"

"Oh you don't know? Sirius has a date with some girl, and Charlotte is going to follow him. Thus why she can't come shopping."

"She's following him? This year, it just gets weirder and weirder. First off you break the rules and pull a prank; then Peter actually has a lasting relationship; and now my cousin is stalking my best friend…I'm not quite sure what to say about that."

"Well, maybe you shouldn't say anything about it. I think part of the reason for the argument is just because they like the attention. I mean we all know that they love the spotlight…one more so then the other, but still," I pointed out matter of factly.

"Good point. So should we follow Charlotte who is following Sirius?" asked James, crossing his arms.

"Obviously. Who knows what kind of trouble they'll be getting themselves into. One is crazy already and it just gets worse if you combine two crazy people into the same area."

Good, so James had understood the underlying meaning in my words. He wasn't as stupid as I had made out since first year…guess that was another wrong assumption on my part. But I would not be letting the girls know that; it would only provoke them into making these not-so funny jokes that only they understood.

Looking down at my watch I realized how late it was getting. I barely had enough time to drop off my stuff at the dorms, only to get back for patrols.

"I should get going…can't exactly carry all of these books with me on night duties can I?" I said. "I'll see you in a few then?"

With a toss of my hair I gathered my books and walked out of the meeting room. It wasn't until I was in the corridor that I realized that I had been holding my breath the whole conversation.

**A/N: Sorry that it isn't as good as usual...but I'm working on it. The next chapter should be better.**


	13. Hogsmeade

**A/N: Sorry for the long delay, but I finally got my muse back for a little bit anyhow. This is one of the longer chapters though not neccessarily better. Thanks to shetlandlace, Artemis Hunt, and IhaveaRANDOMsister for reviewing!!**

Chapter 12- Hogsmeade

(No POV)

(Costume shop, Hogsmeade)

"You are bloody annoying," muttered Sirius under his breath. Ever since breakfast that morning, she kept one-upping him on his comments and he was the only one not appreciative of them. "Go to hell Menegat."

"Meet you there Black," hissed Charlotte, looking like she wanted to smack him silly. Or hex him or something.

"And if you two don't shut up, you'll both be sorry!" said Peter, shooting both of them daggers. The boys had already lost too much sleep listening to Sirius complain about what wrongdoing Charlotte did when and didn't need to lose what little sanity they had left. Same went for the girls.

"So…what about this one Elizabeth?" asked Violet, holding up a something with pom-poms and feathers. It had to be one of the most awkward costumes in the world.

Elizabeth wrinkled her nose in disgust.

"Definitely no! And it had to match Remus's costume anyways," relied Elizabeth, nudging Remus in the stomach. He pretended to double over in jest.

"I have an idea," started off Sirius, seemingly out of nowhere. Instanteously everyone groaned. Usually when he said that he had an idea, the idea ended up being either utterly ridiculous or illegal or both. He pretended to look offended and continued on. "Remus and Elizabeth can be an old married couple, Violet can be some dark fairy, Peter can be a colonial dude, James and Lily can be a prince and princess respectively, and Menegat can be an old crone."

"Really Sirius, who knows where you get these twisted conceptions. Are you sure that you did not get dropped on your head as a baby?" replied Lily dryly, not missing the fact that he had just insulted Charlotte in two ways; first by calling her by her surname and second by his idea of her costume.

Everyone looked over at Charlotte to see if she would say anything. She just shrugged her shoulders and glared at Sirius. They were all quite surprised by this, especially Sirius, because surely she would have some retort to make; she always did.

"Excuse me miss?" started Charlotte, gesturing to the sales assistant. "We're looking for costumes and I was wondering if you had man-whore costumes for these gentlemen? Oh wait, he's already wearing one."

At the latter point she casually pointed at Sirius. She raised an eyebrow at him, as if daring him to make some retort. He didn't and after Lily explained the whole thing to the confused sales assistant, they all burst into laughter with the exception of Sirius and Charlotte. He hadn't thought that it was very funny and she hadn't been joking.

"That was a good one Charlotte," said James. He shot Sirius an apologetic look. "Sorry mate, she got you there."

"And once again older proves not only wiser, but funnier," commented Violet shaking her head. "You're incorrigible Charlotte. That poor sales lady…she looked helplessly confused."

"I think if they're going to keep acting like that, though, we should split up to look for costumes. Otherwise we'll be wishing we had," said Remus, the ever sensible one.

Well they couldn't argue with that, although Sirius and Charlotte attempted their best to say that they were on their best behavior. The other six of them weren't as gullible as the pair had hoped they would be, plus they were pretty bad liars so it worked out.

"So who are you guys taking to the ball?" asked Remus, making sure that the girls were out of earshot.

"I'm taking Serena. You know things are looking pretty good for us," said Peter, happily. And he had no reason not to be happy about that. Not only had this been Peter's longest lasting relationship, but she was also a fair-looking girl with dirty blonde hair and a smattering of freckles. The fellow seventh-year seemed to dote on him, just as much as he doted on him. A perfect match.

"Good for you Wormtail," said Sirius, cheerfully smacking Peter on the back. "And we all know Moony is going with Beth…so what about you mate? You going to ask Lily?"

James couldn't deny that a year ago he would've asked Lily out. Over and over again until she was on the verge of hexing him. But not this year. It was not that he had fallen out of love…he was probably more smitten with the fellow head girl than ever, but they had just become friends and he didn't want to mess anything up. This was his single last chance. One more strike and he would be out.

"Nah. It just isn't the right time. And I don't want to make Lily mad or anything," replied James, shrugging his shoulders. "I'll probably go stag. What about you Padfoot?"

"Hm, I'll probably take my date from today if things go well," said Sirius, although his statement was as said as enthusiastically or as heartfelt as the other boys.

There actually was someone he'd rather take, however there was the slight complication of him being in a fight with that particular person. Sirius glanced towards where the four girls were laughing and thought about how nice it would be to pretend these many arguments had never happened. With a jolt, he realized that he only had the eyes for one blue-eyed girl. Oh great. The one girl he actually wanted to go out with and she was, at the time being, the most unattainable girl at Hogwarts.

"Padfoot, mate, why don't you just ask her to go with you to the ball?" asked James, not missing a beat. He had seen his best friend continually cast longing glances at his cousin over the past few weeks and as much as it creeped him out, he wanted them to be together. Because, after all, in the long run, wouldn't it be better to see them kissing than hearing them argue? If he really didn't want to see them, he could just take off his glasses; it wasn't that easy with his ears though.

"Because that would only bring disaster Prongs simply because she hates my guts; besides you know that she's prejudiced against going out with teammates, in case they break up," said Sirius, shifting his gaze from Charlotte's sparkling eyes back to the costume rack in front of him. He hated this fight and everything it had done to their friendship and he hated how her eyes never sparkled at him anymore because they were always yelling at each other. Instead he received these steel glares that could've cut ice and seemed so distant from the usually bubbly Charlotte.

"I don't think that it would hurt to try. What ever happened to the 'great Sirius Black', the guy who feared nothing and often flaunts that fact at the breakfast table?" asked Remus, smirking slightly.

"Not to mention that she'll be more likely to say yes if you go up to her and show that humility that you've seemed to leave back at platform nine and three quarters…" continued James, smirking as well.

"And I'm pretty sure that she thinks that you hate her guts likewise. You two have done nothing but argue constantly about trivial facts twenty-four seven," piped in Peter.

Sirius growled at them. They didn't seem to know when to let up and appeared to revel in the fact that they had found a way to make fun of Sirius, instead of the other way around. Oh, her would not be forgetting this.

"Now see here. I appreciate the advice, but I am not asking Charlotte to the ball or ever, end of story. There are loads of other fish in the sea and a bunch of them are better looking and wouldn't beat me up if they got offended by something I said," replied Sirius, fully irritated. He took one last look at the girl in question's long golden hair that was tied up in a splendid ponytail. "And I don't want to hear another word about it. Or else you three will be very sorry. Now, we have until noon and we haven't found costumes yet."

He started angrily pushing through costumes, as the other boys raised their eyebrows at each other. They hadn't expected that reaction just because they had been jesting. Really, Sirius knew how to dish it out, but couldn't handle it? Once this whole debacle was over and done with, they would not be letting him forget this moment; it was too good to be true.

* * *

"Honestly Charlotte, you're awful!" exclaimed Lily, as the girls walked over to a different area of the store.

"I aim to tell the truth," replied Charlotte, trying to be as serious as possible, though the whole effect she was going for was ruined by the glints of mirth in eyes and the wrinkles at her nose from attempting not to laugh; overall this just produced a comical look, and finally she succumbed and gave in to a fit of giggles. "So ladies, who will be taking who to the dance, save Miss Elizabeth Waldorf?"

"Yeah, she already has a man. Aw, they grow up so quickly! Before you know it, she'll be married," teased Violet, lightly pinching one of Elizabeth's cheeks in an affectionate way.

"Shut up," said Elizabeth, blushing as she smacked Violet's hand away. "You know you're just jealous because you haven't gone out with anyone steady since fourth year."

She smirked as Lily and Charlotte erupted into another round of laughter. Violet's only response was to quirk one eyebrow and smile.

"Touché dear Beth, touché; I suppose I deserved that one, eh?" commented Violet, laughing as well. "All comments about my lacking love life aside, I actually do have a date. I'm going with Parson…y'know the Hufflepuff whom Slughorn hates because he sits in the back of the Potions classroom and does nothing?"

The other three girls nodded their heads, deciding not to say anything about that. Johnny Parson was another seventh year that none of the girls, none of the Gryffindors really knew that well, simply because he was a major slacker and always seemed to have the smell of cigarette smoke about him. There was no doubt that he was certainly attractive enough with his messy dark brown hair and crystal blue eyes, but he was a bit of a loner. They weren't worried though; Violet always seemed to go for the "bad guys" and since being at Hogwarts she had dated a lot worse.

"What about you Charlie? Please say that you aren't going alone again. You've done that for the past two or three years…and that's for almost every single event. C'mon live a little!" continued Violet, even though she knew what the answer would be. It was the same routine every single year since Charlotte had broken up with the infamous Bradley. Boy, he really had caused a lot of problems hadn't he? First the topic of the impending event would come up. Then Charlotte would inch around the subject until right before the event and pretend that there was no possible way she could get a date.

"Sorry to disappoint Vi, but much to your dissatisfaction I will be going by myself. It much to late to get a date, don't you think?" replied Charlotte, trying to banish thoughts of a certain boy with shaggy black hair and a dazzling smile. Why it was shame thinking of him like that, especially when he was younger than she was. But his smile…she hadn't seen that smile in her direction in over a month.

"What's on your mind now? Thinking about Sirius again?" teased Lily, knowing exactly where to push her buttons.

"Of course not, you mad woman. I'm just a little spacey today," said Charlotte, making a face at Lily. Must everyone jump to conclusions? How was she to know that Charlotte hadn't been thinking about what she wanted to buy at Hogsmeade later that day?

"Well, maybe you'd be interested in knowing that he's staring at you?" said Elizabeth in a sing-song voice.

Very unsubtly, Charlotte whipped her head around to see if it was true. Of course she should have believed Elizabeth to begin with, but she had to see it for herself. It was all true. It was as if time had stopped and all she could think about were Sirius's gray eyes staring into her blue-gray irises. In a romance novel, this would've been that perfect moment when the girl and guy ran into each other's arms and passionately declared that the other had been silly and that they were her hopelessly in love with the other. Unfortunately this was reality and not a romance novel and in reality, she blinked and glared furiously at him. She felt a pang of regret, but it would pass wouldn't it? So she had a conscience all of a sudden. All because a split second later, Sirius broke the glare and actually blushed, maybe because he had been caught staring?

"I've said it before and I'll say it again. Really Charlotte, you're awful towards him," said Lily, jolting Charlotte out of her wandering thoughts that had nothing to do with searching for costumes.

"I do believe that you are the first person to make Sirius Black blush like that," said Elizabeth, furthering Charlotte out of her stupor. "Congratulations are in order I suppose."

"Are you serious? You've never seen the boy turn red before? Trust me it's no big deal," scoffed Charlotte, crossing her arms over her chest.

"That m'dear was a gentle shade of pink and it was due to a girl. I'm pretty sure that that's as good as proof as any that he likes you," replied Elizabeth.

"And by the way your eyes just flashed, I'm pretty sure you like him back," said Violet, smirking the way that Elizabeth had smirked at her minutes ago.

"Me like him? Why you've gotten too many bludgers to the head Violet! That's absolutely rich. What in the world makes you think that?" asked Charlotte, laughing tentatively.

"Let see, first off you blush every time we question you about what happened that night you got caught in the boys' dormitories. Second, you two plague each other like two little kids who have crushes on each other, and third, you aimed the quaffle right at his head at practice the other day," said Violet. "It makes perfect sense."

"Please tell me you're kidding…you think that I like Black because we bicker?" said Charlotte, rolling her eyes. When no one replied, she started at her friends rather incredulously. "I can't believe you guys are serious! This must be some horrible joke."

"And for your information, even if I did like him, which I don't, it could never work out," continued Charlotte, the latter part some what bitterly. "For one thing he's just looking for a fling and easy lay, while I want something that lasts. And let's not forget everything he's done to me since school started. First, he says I'm not a girl; then he thinks he can tell me what I can and can not do, he calls me a bitch, and to top it all off he refuses to pass me the bloody quaffle…there's a reason why there are three Chasers, not two!"

"Methinks, thou doth protest too much," muttered Lily under her breath.

"Fine. Have it your way. I can see that there's no pleasing you lot with the truth. Can we just get on with the shopping, eh? Yeesh," said Charlotte, turning to face the rack in front of her.

"Would it be rude to point out that she was the one to bring up dates?" whispered Violet to Lily.

"I heard that!" exclaimed Charlotte, refusing to turn her head from the costumes in front of her.

"Take that as a no…" whispered back Lily.

* * *

After spending the morning shopping the eight of them had met back at the front of the shop, purchases in hand. Notably, Sirius was avoiding Charlotte and vice versa. They had lunch at The Leaky Cauldron, and a few butterbeers later they split up to go their separate ways that afternoon. Oddly enough no one seemed to notice that James and Lily were hanging out together, nor that Charlotte had this weird look on her face. Then again maybe they just didn't feel like pointing it out.

"So what now?" asked Lily, crouching down behind a bush.

"Well, there's Sirius sitting on that bench across the way and there's Charlotte behind the tree over there," replied James, gesturing somewhere to the right. He shrugged his shoulders. "I guess we just wait until his date shows up and then will the sparks fly."

"He admitted that he likes Charlotte by the way. It was earlier at the costume shop," continued James, in an effort to break the silence that was growing between them.

"Is that so?" said Lily, sounding amused. "Because your dear cousin is in a sad state of denial. I'm assuming she gets her stubbornness from your side of the family…"

"Hey!" exclaimed James, swatting at Lily. "I am not stubborn, I just have a strong tendency to brood over my own opinions and ignore everyone else's."

"Um, yeah that's what stubborn means silly," teased Lily.

It was kind of funny. As late as one month ago, if anyone had told her that she would be friends with James Potter, she would've started howling with laughter and would've told that person that he or she was out of his or her mind and should recheck his or her crystal ball. Lily couldn't quite believe it now. But yet here she was on a covet mission with a new friend and spying on their best friends to boot. What had happened to her this year? First she had pulled not one, but three pranks, actually got along with the head boy contrary to prior belief, and was spying on purpose without thinking of any rules. She wondered how long it would be before she was sneaking out to Hogsmeade and receiving detentions.

After a few more minutes of silence and making sure that Sirius's mystery date hadn't arrived yet, James suggested," So after this whole ordeal is over, I thought that we could hand out and get to know each other, now that we're friends and all. After all out of all my friends, I know you the least."

He tried to be careful with his words; James didn't want to make this sound like a date or anything. To be honest he'd much rather have Lily as a friend if it meant no more fights and no more one-sided hatred. She was finally starting to trust him and he had worked hard to gain her respect. Of course in due time he would try again at a shot for love, but for now he would wait. He had waited for five years and one more year wouldn't kill him.

"Well I have a paper due in Ancient Runes on Monday, but I guess a little more free time won't hurt…" replied Lily, shrugging her shoulders. She smiled at James. "Now shh! We won't catch them if we keep talking!"

Wow. James had almost forgotten what it felt like to see her smile directly at him. Oh Lily had smiled around him of course, but it was either a tight smile because she was annoyed at him or a genuine smile, but only because of her friends. Never because of him in particular. Usually because she would be yelling at him because he pulled some prank or something or other.

Every once in awhile one of them would peek over the bushes and look towards the aforementioned bench. And every single time it would still be just Sirius. By now Lily had put on a brown wig. Her fiery red hair could be instanteously recognized and she didn't have the quick Quidditch reflexes that James and Charlotte had, just in case they almost got caught. Of course she wasn't too happy about this as the wig itched like crazy, but she didn't exactly want to get caught either. But within thirty minutes they found that their waiting was not in vain. A very distinct and very familiar female voice could be heard.

"Hello Sirius," said the female. "I'm glad you didn't decide to stand me up."

"Hey yourself Melissa," replied Sirius. "And I could never stand up a beautiful girl such as yourself."

Bloody hell.

James and Lily looked at each other in pure horror. Sirius had to have had a slip of the tongue right? He couldn't possibly be on a date with Melissa, the devil's spawn in disguise. But one peek over the bush told them that it was all true and more. And in case they had any more doubts, just one glance over at Charlotte's eyes narrowed into little slits, confirmed those doubts. This was going to get very interesting and it also made Sirius sound highly hypocritical. He had said that he wouldn't go on a date with Melissa if his life depended on it, so either he was planning some prank on her or he had only not gone on a date with her out of respect for Charlotte's hatred of the girl. And something told James and Lily that the former was not the correct answer.

"This really makes it a recipe for disaster," said Lily, groaning in half-disgust, half-worry. "Are you sure you didn't know that he was going out with her?"

"Positive Lily! Believe me, if I had known I would've tried anything to stop this," replied James, not taking an eye off of Sirius and Melissa. "C'mon they're on the move!"

* * *

"Never ever again," said Lily, collapsing under one of the trees by the great lake and closing her eyes.

"Agreed," said James, feeling just as exhausted. Who knew that chasing three people around Hogsmeade could be so tiring? "Though you have to admit it was pretty amusing when Sirius thought he saw Charlotte in the reflection of the window and started freaking out."

"Yes, I don't think the shop owners will ever be the same," said Lily, laughing. "Or what about when the street vendor stopped Charlotte and attempted to get her to buy something…"

"Hm, that was a pretty funny incident too. But I think my favorite was when Sirius and Melissa saw us and started heading over and I grabbed a pair of sunglasses from the table behind us and stuffed them on your nose. And then they didn't even recognize you…Olga," replied James, his eyes glinting with mirth.

"Shut up, that was the first name I thought of. I still can't believe that they bought that story about you having tea with some long lost relative thrice-removed. They sure are gullible," said Lily.

A silence fell over them, more of a peaceful silence rather then the silence full of tension an hour earlier. Neither of them quite knew what to do next and appreciated the gentle lull, save the occasional chuckle and giggle due to remembering some other mishap that had taken place during their semi-successful adventure. And now this was something that the two of them shared. And they could not be telling anyone about it.

"Favorites!" exclaimed James out of no where..

"Pardon?" asked Lily, opening her eyes and looking at James as if he had gone mad. After all hadn't they just been sitting in silence.

"Er, sorry. I was just thinking about what we could start off with," said James, explaining his sudden outburst. Lily's mouth formed a nice 'o' before she nodded her head in agreement. "So color? Mine is red."

"Green. Class?"

"Defense against the dark arts, though transfiguration runs a close second. You?"

"Charms, definitely. And then arithmacy."

"You know I can never understand how you can be taking so many classes."

"What? It's just charms, potions, defense against the dark arts, transfiguration, herbology, ancient runes, and arithmacy…"

"Yeah, Lily, that's seven classes. I'm only taking five classes."

"Yes, well…you could take something else if you wanted to."

And so it went on, with lots of lively banter and a friendly threat to shove a certain black-haired guy into the lake. And later when they went back inside the castle and each had a smile on their face, they found it rather hard to explain to their friends. Especially when they ended up spending most of their evening without smiles on their faces because they were trying to keep Charlotte from clawing out Sirius's eyes. Though they did have a good laugh when Sirius suggested that James take his relative Olga to the ball…

**A/N: Whew, you've gotten through it. I hope you guys liked it and please review **


	14. Quidditch Woes

**A/N: Thanks to shetlandlace, WhyDoesAWebSiteNeedMyName, buttonbit, and IhaveaRANDOMsister for reviewing! Surprisingly it didn't take me two months to complete this chapter, but a long time nonetheless. Hopefully my next chapter won't take as long to writeup.**Chapter 13- Quidditch Woes

* * *

(Sirius's POV)

"Is it really so hard to throw the Quaffle at the hoops? What do you need, a flashing-neon arrow?" exclaimed Charlotte exasperated.

It had been the end of another Quidditch practice. And much to Charlotte's dismay I had the unfortunate luck of missing my last shot. Of course she wasn't going to believe that it was just bad luck, more that I had done it on purpose.

"I misthrew once! Once out of twenty shots! Actually I'd like to see you do better!" I shot back. Actually I lied. I hadn't misthrown the Quaffle because of bad luck; it was because I was distracted by the sight of Melissa, who had somehow become my girlfriend within the past three weeks. But Charlotte didn't know and I found that for once in my life I didn't have the nerve to tell her the truth…she had been so moody lately and this would only set her off even more.

"Errgh, your memory is bloody selective! I did do better than you! Remember, I had twenty out of twenty perfect aims?"

Shoot. She had done better than me. Everything came back so clearly now. Great, just great. She wasn't going to let me forget about this, would she? Though as Remus would say, this was karma coming back to bite me.

"Fine. You trumped me this time. But it was just practice at any rate. What does it matter."

Charlotte gave me a surprised look, clearly off balance by the fact that I hadn't attempted to fight back. Why would I? It was clear that I was in the wrong here…wait did I just admit that I was in the wrong? Geez…I was whipped and not by my girlfriend either. Just great. The last thing I needed was for Charlotte to know that I liked her.

"Well it matters because in a game that one missed shot could cost us a win!" She wasn't planning on not arguing with me, was she? Well if it was a fight she wanted.

"Oh c'mon! There is one in a billion chances of that happening! The idea that that could happen in a simple Hogwarts match is very slim to none, most definitely betting on the latter."

"Ah but we could be that one in a billion game! After all we're playing Slytherin, and that will make a difference! Look James is having an optional practice tomorrow. You better be there," said Charlotte, disdainfully, with a shake of her head.

Okay I definitely got a mouthful of her long blonde ponytail right there. She really needs to watch where she swings that thing. It could hurt someone, namely myself. And I can't ruin my precious face and deny the girls a look at what a real guy looks like.

"So…excited for the ball this weekend?" I choose my words carefully, tempted to ask if she was going with any boy to the dance, but she would fly off the handle if I asked her that. No, it was better to remain on the down-low.

"Well duh! I don't think I know someone who isn't excited. Think sometimes Black!"

Ouch. The fact that she was calling me by my surname hurt more than her comment about my intelligence, oddly enough. I think it was because I wasn't used to her not calling me by my first name or some cute alternative nickname. I had known Charlotte since our second year when I had met her at one of James' family reunions. Lately I had been wishing that she was acting more like her younger self, the girl who basically didn't argue with anyone if she could help it, which made me wonder why it was so easy for her to scowl and fight with me. Did people really change that easily?

* * *

(Gryffindor common room)

(Lily's POV)

There were only four days left until the Halloween Ball after more than a month of preparations. It had seemed like ages ago that the fellow prefects, James, and I were arguing over simple matter such as lighting, which now seemed quite trivial. I found myself worrying about the lack of things to do as it seemed that we had actually completed everything to the very last period on the list.

Everything around Hogwarts seemed more filled with tensions than usual due to the impending ball and all. Of course that wasn't the only thing sparking gossip around the school. Charlotte was scarcely seen and when she was seen, she was either doing homework or furiously practicing for the Quidditch game. Personally I was pretty excited by her decision to finally be more responsible by taking initiative, but the others weren't. Admittedly this change of behavior was highly suspicious and very much unlike the Charlotte we had all grown to love. Before she had always been a little obsessed about Quidditch, but now she was bloody insane!

As her cousin and friend, James was quite worried about Charlotte's well-being. But as her Quidditch captain he was bloody bouncing off the walls of the castle, ecstatic that she had finally fixed some handicap of hers. Along with that, he was also angry at Sirius and Charlotte because according to Violet, Sirius and Charlotte wouldn't pass the Quaffle to each other. The last straw had been when Charlotte and Sirius hexed each other…of course this latter part was just a rumor and wouldn't be confirmed by anyone on the team. And with that the complete silent treatment had ended and Charlotte and Sirius only talked to each other grudgingly and through clenched teeth.

I sat one of the comfy common room chairs going through my notes, an Ancient Runes textbook open on my lap. It was a fascinating subject and shame that Remus was my only other friend who took the course. We had a meeting with McGonagall the week after the Halloween Ball for further consideration to what we would do after Hogwarts, more of a continuation of the private conferences we had had in our fifth year. The only difference was that this meeting was for the entire seventh year Gryffindor class instead of individually. I was nervous as all of this could go to waste depending on how our NEWTs went, though James was right that I should worry. After all NEWTs were in May and that was months away.

Oh I think I hear Charlotte coming!

(No POV)

"He didn't show up for the extra practice," grumbled Charlotte as she plopped into the empty, adjacent seat to Lily. "I told him that he needed to practice his throw and what does he do? He runs off to the bid of the school slut."

"You're jealous," pointed out Lily, trying not to laugh as she closed her Ancient Runes textbook.

Charlotte actually did laugh, though it was a fake laugh at that. "You sad, naïve little girl! As I have explained millions of times before, I am not jealous of that. You know how obsessive I am about Quidditch…I want to win badly."

"What would you give to win?"

"Anything."

"Including admitting that you're jealous?"

"Okay when I said anything, I meant anything but that." Charlotte scowled at Lily, knowing exactly what game she was playing at.

"Why not, got something to hide?"

"Absolutely not. I do not want to date my cousin's best friend. Besides if anyone has anything to hide it's you."

"But I don't have a crush on my cousin's best friend."

"No, instead you have a crush on your best friend's cousin. It's the opposite way around."

"Whoa! I do not like James!"

"Oh please; I know that he doesn't have a cousin Olga, no matter what Black is insisting to everybody. Now either it was you, who had a burning desire to be a brunette, or it was some girl who for some odd reason didn't want to broadcast that she was on a date with the famous James Potter."

"It was not a date!" protested Lily. She gave a disapproving shake of her head. "We were just hanging out as friends, just like you and Remus."

"Ah, yes, but first off whenever Remus and I have tea, I don't feel the need to change my hair color whereas you did. Also Remus hasn't had a crush on me since our third year, so no one would think anything of it."

Charlotte smirked, clearly enjoying the sudden change in subject topic. Really, Lily was supposed to be smarter than this; she should've realized that Charlotte knew the Potter family tree way back. Besides the sooner Lily and James got together, the less reason for James to mope around come Christmastime.

She was jolted out of her teasing spree by the sound of two voices right outside of the entrance to the Gryffindor tower. Two very familiar male voices to be exact. In fact if she didn't know better, one of those voices better hope that they had a good excuse…

All Lily saw was a flash of a long blonde ponytail and then the portrait door open…upon entering the common room James and Sirius were greeted by the coolness of Charlotte's glare. It was all too clear who the glare was for and James backed off, going to stand next to Lily. Great. More trouble was brewing.

"Where the hell were you?! You missed the whole extra practice completely!" shouted Charlotte, flinging out her arms for emphasis and ending up sending the bag on her arm flying across the room. She let out a slew of curses under her breath.

"Language McGriffen. There are first years around," said Sirius, mustering as much calmness as he could. He was obviously amused at the frightened look on the students' faces even though this wasn't a very funny situation.

"Shut it! All I want to know is why you skipped out on Sierra and myself. This is a team effort and we aren't going to win if you slack off doing lord knows what!"

"I was busy," replied Sirius curtly, settling his angry eyes on her fiery eyes. He didn't see the point in trying to defend himself; if anything it might make things worse. "It wasn't even a required practice, thus the word optional. I don't see why you're so worked up."

"Oh honestly, is it so hard for you to tell the truth? I know, they all know that you're dating Melissa and that you were most liking snogging her!" hissed Charlotte, her expression stiff like stone. All the emotion was devoid from her face, save the two bright red spots on her cheeks. Ignoring Lily's hand-waving and James' slashing of his hand across his neck, she continued on. "Since when has the girl been better than the game? You don't think sometimes!"

(Charlotte's POV)

Whoa. Where did that come from? I'm not even supposed to know about it!

(Sirius's POV)

Did not see that coming at all…how the hell did she find out anyways?

(Lily's POV)

She actually went there. Can she not read my signal telling her not to continue her little tirade? It certainly wasn't because I felt the need to dance!

(James' POV)

I can't believe she did that. Way to make a scene, Charlie. Now everyone's staring at us four.

(No POV)

"Look I can explain Charlie," started Sirius, guilt written over his features.

She scowled, a low growl rising in the back of her throat. "You aren't allowed to call me that. Only friends can call me Charlie and you are certainly not a friend of mine. Do you know what it's like to have random people come up to you and ask how you feel about Sirius and Melissa dating. And then realizing that within the past three weeks, you weren't going to tell me that you were dating my enemy?"

James looked at Lily, an eyebrow raised, asking if this was true. Lily nodded, her mouth forming the word 'painful', though without making so much as a sound. Of course, Charlotte had known about that one date, but she had found out about the other dates simply due to the gossiping Hogwarts population. And the rest of them, James, Lily, Remus, Peter, Elizabeth, and Violet just hadn't had the heart to tell the truth to Charlotte. So of course Charlotte had vehemently denied that there were any going-ons at first, until she had realized that everyone else knew and she didn't. Lily knew that she would hate it, say if Violet dated Severus or something like that.

"Oh come off it! As if you were telling me anything either! I heard from someone, definitely not you, that you were contemplating skipping classes because you were bored," shot back Sirius, color rising in his cheeks as well.

"We will not talk about my lack of love for school now," hissed Charlotte, fury washing over her. Since when was he all high and mighty like Lily and Remus about NEWTs anyhow? "This conversation isn't over Black."

She looked around, suddenly seeing that not only were James and Lily listening in on this loud conversation, but also a growing group of young Gryffindors. One cold look sent them scattering and with a huff, Charlotte turned on her heel and stormed upstairs, nearly knocking over one poor first year that hadn't moved out of the way fast enough. Yep, she was pissed.

* * *

(Boys' Dormitories)

All was silent on the Gryffindor front, save the whispering about the latest events between the people who had actually been there versus those who had not, and two seventeen year old boys who laid awake in their beds. One had messy black hair and was calmly putting his glasses on his bedside table; the other had slightly shaggier hair and was currently fuming at the ceiling.

"Stop grumbling Padfoot, you had this coming. Look I know that this whole ordeal is ridiculous and that you two were fighting, but its just a rut. You guys were still supposed to be friends, and this is what happens when you lie to your friends," said James. "How would you feel if Charlotte started to date Amos Diggory?"

"I don't like him," said Sirius reluctantly.

"Exactly. Wouldn't you want her to tell you if she dated him, instead of blatantly lying about the relationship?"

"Well…" Sirius let out a groan of frustration. "Damn Prongs, how and when did you become so smart?"

A silence fell over the boys as Sirius waited for James' answer. It seemed like James had fallen asleep and all he could hear was Peter snoring from the direction of his bed. But after a few minutes he could hear James voice and he could tell that his best friend was being completely serious.

"Simple," replied James, smiling in the dark. "I fell in love."

**

* * *

**

A/N: Hope you enjoyed this chapter...I don't think its as good as it sort of goes on and on. But next chapter will be better! After all it's the Halloween Ball chapter Please review, thanks!


	15. The Halloween Ball

**A/N: Thank you so much to shetlandlace, IhaveaRANDOMsister, marauder rox, and emo-maruder-d-93 for reviewing! Sorry for the long wait...at this rate, I'll have the Christmas chapter up by Christmas-time, eh? xDD**

Chapter 14- The Halloween Ball

It was the night of the Halloween Ball, the big event of the fall season, the thing that almost every female student had been gossiping about for the past few weeks. All this preparation would be over within a matter of hours. Though school had officially started back in September, this event was like the big bang that everyone was looking forward to that would really start of the school year. the frenzy that surrounded everyone was happier than usual as last minute changes took place and masks were being unearthed from trunks. And certainly no one was more frenzied than Lily and James. For them the ball had to be flawless. This would be their first mark as the head students and there was no room for mistake, even if it was the slightest smidge. So you could imagine Lily's fright when Violet decided to be a brat and tease her while they were getting ready in their dorm room.

"Lily, I lost my drumsticks dearie, the glitzy ones I got for my birthday…" trailed off Violet as she sat at the vanity, rimming her eyes with heavy eyeliner.

Lily whirled around, her face pale. "No, Vi! You need those! What the hell are you thinking?"

"Easy, they're right here," said Violet, attempting to stifle a chortle, but failing miserably. She picked up the slender s ticks in her hand and twirled them around.

"You…and…ergh!" exclaimed Lily, scowling and glaring at her friend. "That wasn't funny."

Violet shrugged her shoulders and turned back to the mirror so that she could finish her makeup. It wasn't really her problem that Lily was so uptight this evening. Everything was going to be fine and the red-head just simply had to learn to calm down at some point or another.

"Chill ladies. Violet stop teasing Lily. Lily…go take an anxiety pill or something," said Charlotte, rolling her eyes as she exited the bathroom. She slung an arm around Elizabeth. "And you m'dear need to stay your lovey-dovey way and give Remus a big smack for me."

Charlotte motioned for the three girls to come join her at the mirror, once they had completed. They stood there, and Violet let out a low whistle. They actually looked pretty decent. Lily was wearing a tight dress with a blue bodice and peacock feathers down the sides, dressed as a peacock of course. Her red hair fell down her shoulders and gleamed in the light. Charlotte was dressed as…well she didn't know quite what it was, but she had on short black shorts, a blue shirt with small rhinestones on it, knee-high boots, and a fake fun attached to her hip, her hair also left down. Elizabeth was a casino girl, dressed in a tight black skirt, a white blouse, and ruby red vest, with a nice little bow; her hair was in a side braid and she actually looked average height. And lastly, but not least, Violet was Cleopatra, a red skirt around her waist and a midriff bearing halter top with gold trim. Bangles completed her ensemble.

And now…for the masks. Lily tossed one to each of the girls; she had the feather-trimmed one, Charlotte had the black jeweled one, Elizabeth had a different black mask with sequins, and Violet had a bright red mask. After tying on the masks, they gave each other secretive smiles and bounded down the stairs towards the great hall, where they were to meet the boys.

Upon meeting the boys, they grinned seeing their costumes. James was some sort of candy man, with a long red coat, white pants, black boots, a black top-hat and a black mask. Sirius was his own little version of a marauder with an entirely black ensemble, complete with a black hat and silver sword, and a silver strip of fabric across his face. Remus was in a matching casino outfit to Elizabeth's, with a black pinstripe suit and red vest, also wearing a white hat and red mask. And dear Peter was a military officer in camouflage, a hard hat and a fake gun across his back and a green mask. Lily had to let out a little giggle at the fact that all four of them were wearing hats.

"Are you ladies ready to enter the great hall?" asked James, bowing to Lily. She flushed and smacked him on the head for his dramatics. The other girls nodded their heads eagerly and the guys took the girls hands and prepared to enter.

"Rawr," said Charlotte unenthusiastically as she made a note of not looking at Sirius, especially when Melissa ganged up to them and stole Sirius away. "Let's party, eh?

This was going to be a long night…

Once inside and just looking at all of the decorations, Charlotte, Elizabeth, Violet, Remus, and Peter were in awe. Lily and James and the rest of the prefects had really done a fabulous job transforming the great hall into the perfect setting for a Halloween ball. There were no cheesy paper streamers of orange and black or any specific color schemes really, though there were the usual over-abundance of cobwebs and the ceiling had been turned into a clear night sky under a canopy of leaves. As Lily and James had decided they had moved some trees to edge around the walls of the great hall giving a woodsy theme as if they were actually in the forbidden forest. Only they weren't. A stage had been propped up where the staff table usually was and various round tables were placed around the dance floor, which was metallic black, gleaming as the lights bounced off of it. Everyone of the students and professors alike looked splendid and anybody who had had any doubts about how the event would turn out, knew instanteously that it would be a hit.

"Good job guys," said Peter, grinning. "I'll see you lot later, eh? I've got to find Serena."

He hurried off in a different direction to find his girlfriend and date. Violet turned to James and Remus. "You know, you can tell him that Serena is free to hang out with us. She's nice and we don't mind her like a different marauder's girlfriend."

She rolled her eyes towards the direction where Melissa had tugged Sirius and with her bids of goodbyes went off to go find her date. Remus and Elizabeth went to go dance whilst Lily, Charlotte, and James all stood there, somewhat awkwardly. They had been the three people unfortunate to not have dates. Not that they minded so much.

"Jamie, dear, I'm afraid that I will have to steal dear Lily away from you to have the first dance. But you can have her after that," teased Charlotte, winking at James. She took Lily's hand and smiled apologetically at her cousin. If he thought that him and Lily were going to dance the whole night away leaving her in the dust, he was wrong. Besides if he got too much of Lily he might lose his head and ruin what he had fixed within the past two months.

James smacked Charlotte in the head at the familiar childhood nickname, but let her drag of Lily. He would get his chance at some point tonight, even if he had to steal the head girl off the dance floor and towards the punch bowl. And besides at the moment, he thought that Charlotte needed Lily more than he did at the moment. He and Lily were getting along, while Charlotte and Sirius were not, so that had to take a toll.

The great hall was filled with much laughter as the band played on and many sorts of people danced with each other. It was fun to see what everybody's costumes were, though for the most part it was pretty easy to tell who was who. Even the Slytherins seemed to be having fun against their better judgment. Charlotte danced with James a few times, as with Peter and Remus, and they pretty much all exchanged partners and danced with each other, with the exception of Sirius and his date and Violet and her date. Those four were nowhere to be seen, though it was only a question of what they were doing more than where they were. And they all agreed that Serena was really nice and they were happy that Peter had her, which they all told Peter when Serena went off to the bathroom, making him proud that he had such a good girlfriend.

(Much, much later…)

"Why won't you dance with me?" whined an all-too familiar nasty voice. Charlotte and Lily looked around for the source and saw Sirius sitting at one of the empty tables with some brunette in an azure blue mask. The two girls exchanged looks.

_Melissa_…

"I've already told you, I'm not in the mood," grumbles Sirius, not looking at his date and current girlfriend. Melissa huffed, not looking very pleased with his answer. She had probably imagined the two of them dancing the whole night away and being the envy of the entire school. Too bad her plan wasn't working quite the way she wanted it to be…she was finding out the hard way that being with Sirius wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

"Look, they're fighting!" Charlotte exclaimed much too gleefully, probably looking the happiest she had been in weeks. Lily rolled her eyes, but she wasn't going to complain; that would be too easy.

"Well, when will you be in the mood? This is so boring!" said Melissa, examining her nails.

"I don't know. Maybe never," replied Sirius, tensely, not bothering to look at Melissa, instead looking very concentrated at the floor.

She scowled, making her look even uglier in Lily's opinion. Melissa stood up and spat her next words at Sirius. "Well if you aren't going to dance with me, then I'll find someone who will! This relationship is over Sirius Black!" She stormed away, but not before glaring at everyone that was staring at them. This whole scene seemed to have no effect on Sirius as he shrugged his shoulders and five minutes later, Lily and Charlotte could hear a shriek from the bathroom, a tell-tale sign that it really was over between them and that someone didn't really care. Lily raised an eyebrow delicately. She had half a mind to dock points from Sirius for an unprovoked assault on someone, but…it was Halloween and Melissa had been acting like a brat. She supposed that her head girl skills could wait until a couple of days later.

"So, you going to go over and snog some sense into him?" teased Lily, prodding Charlotte softly in the back. Charlotte shook her head, furiously.

"No, he doesn't deserve that after what he's done to me…what he needs is a friend," said Charlotte, slowly. She turned her head to look at her red-headed friend. "I suppose it's a draw then."

Lily grinned. So this was what two months of fighting had been chiseled down to. And she had to admit that she hadn't felt prouder of Charlotte for all was going to be right in the world again. "Charlotte, I think it's been a draw for a long time now. Just both of you were too thick-headed to do anything about it."

Charlotte laughed her first real, genuine laugh within the past week. Lily called it thick-headedness…she preferred to think that it was stubbornness. "I'm still mad at him though…I'm not going to apologize until he does. He should've told me that he was dating the deadliest thing to walk the planet. He may need a friend, but that friend isn't going to be me." And within seconds the one moment of compassion that Charlotte had had, had disappeared and she was back to her thick-headed self, just as hot-headed as ever.

"You are impossible," said Lily, shaking her head. But this had come in a full circle thus far right? It had to work out eventually…but then she got an awful thought. What if Charlotte and Sirius just kept bouncing around each other, only making awkward comments for the rest of their seventh year? That would be awful.

"Lily, Charlie!" said Elizabeth, running up to them out of nowhere with Violet. She gestured towards the stage. "It's almost time!"

The four girls looked at each other. Five minutes…they weaved their way through the dancing masses, over to the bathroom.

(Five minutes later…)

"Where are the girls?" asked Remus, taking a gulp from his cup of butterbeer.

James shrugged his shoulders. "Beats me. I thought I saw Violet dancing over by the speakers a few minutes ago, but I haven't seen anyone since…though there was this odd girl with neon green hair exiting the bathroom before. She looked vaguely like Melissa, but…" He shrugged again. Remus opened his mouth to say something, but they were interrupted by someone clearing their voice right next to the microphone. They looked up towards the stage, along with all of the other students.

Well…this had to be the second band that Lily had been talking about. It would appear that they were all girls, as they were all wearing dresses and heels, complete with the themes of masks. The odd part was that you couldn't see their hair color…or at least their original hair colors. The pianist had cyan hair, the drummer had bright violet hair, one of the guitarists had a bright gold colored hair, and the other guitarist had flaming fuchsia hair. There was no way on earth that they could be their natural colors. James, had to admit that they were doing quite the fair job of keeping their "identities."

"Hey everybody. You guys having a great time?" asked the golden-haired girl. Her voice had a familiar sweet tang to it…he couldn't place his hand on it. A chorus of cheers rang out throughout the Great Hall and the fuchsia-haired girl laughed hoarsely though her microphone.

"Well that's what we like to hear. So this first song is for all of you lazy bones who haven't danced at least once this evening," continued the golden-haired girl. With a snap of her fingers the group started to play some alternative rock mix. Remus and James looked at each other, surprised looks on their faces. The band was actually pretty decent, though they weren't as good as the first band.

(One hour later.)

"Well, that's our last song folks. It's almost midnight and we hope you all know what that means," said the fuchsia-haired girl. She laughed softly and for a second James could've sworn that she was laughing at him. He rubbed his eyes…it had to be a trick; he must've been seeing things.

"So, at the count when we say one, that means its time to take off the masks, all of you," continued the fuchsia-haired girl. "Five, four, three, two, one!"

All of the students chanted along and at the sound of one from the fuchsia-haired girl, a big screen of smoke appeared around the great hall. Before the smoke completely obstructed everyone's views, he definitely saw the golden-haired girl look at him with these brilliant emerald-green eyes…wait. Hold on a blooming second. His mind back-tracked as the cloud settled and the four girls were disappeared from the stage, much to the confusion of the other students. But that was not what James was confused about. There was only one girl that he knew with green eyes of that caliber, but that girl was musically inclined and did not have gold-colored hair. But…she had…there could not be two girls in the realm of Great Britain that had those same green eyes. It wasn't possible. Was it? No, it couldn't be. But…he was definitely more confused now than he had ever been in his life.

He was jolted out of his thoughts by the sound of four girls, one of them the green-eyed girl in question, arriving. Lily and Violet had linked arms and were laughing up a storm, while Charlotte who was laughing, stopped upon seeing Sirius, and Elizabeth tucked her arm in with Remus's.

"Where were you four?" asked Sirius, cocking an eyebrow, purposely not looking at Charlotte.

"Let's see…we went to the bathroom to freshen up…those lines are ridiculously long for the girl's loo!" replied Elizabeth.

"And then we ran into Dumbledore…nice guy, a bit obsessed with sweets though. And then Filch; he thought that we were up to no good, as usual, but our resident head girl was able to convince him otherwise," continued Charlotte, flinging an arm around Lily.

"So that was a good band, eh?" posed Violet, her eyes laughing with mirth, as if she knew something that the three boys did not.

The band…it began to click in his head. Everything was way to coincidental. The disappearances, the similarity of the emerald eyes, the fog when it came time to remove masks, and the extremities for keeping their identities hidden. The girls were the band! One look at Remus, told James that he was thinking the exact same thing.

"You!" exclaimed James, pointing his index finger at Lily.

She raised an eyebrow delicately, in obvious amusement. "Me! Erm, why are you pointing at me?"

"You guys are the band!" he continued. The girls exchanged looks with each other. "It all makes sense! Lily and Charlotte sing and play the guitar, Elizabeth played the piano…and Violet playing with drumsticks she got for her birthday! And you all were disappearing when the band appeared on stage!"

"Oh, hooray, I play the drums. But those drumsticks are from a music shop. Anyone could have the same pair," said Violet. "And just because my eyes are purple, does not mean I want my hair to be the same."

"Me, I hate dresses, you know that. Beats me why I would wear a dress for everyone to see…does that make any sense Jamesie?" asked Charlotte.

"Remus, you know I wouldn't lie to you. I was getting some punch, just ask Raymond Lexi," continued Elizabeth, batting her eyelashes at Remus.

"And I am completely and utterly tone deaf, as we all have figured out many years ago," pointed out Lily.

All four girls wore identical, innocent grins and doe-eyed looks. It was all way too suspicious. Yet they had perfectly, solid alibis which made the situation more confusing if anything else. James, Remus, and Sirius all exchanged a look of disbelief. They really didn't want to believe them, but at the moment, there was nothing they could do, but believe them.

"So…if you three are done interrogating us, we'll be off to the dorms. Y'know, five minutes until we're technically caught out of our beds," said Lily, looking pointedly at James, as he was the head boy. "Potter, you're in charge of clean-up."

And with that the girls smiled again and flounced off, out of the great hall. The boys just stared at their retreating backs, in utter surprise. They had been duped, right?

"Um, Moony, Prongs?" piped up Sirius, his eyes not leaving Charlotte's blonde hair. "There is no one in the school named Raymond Lexi."

Oh, burn.

* * *

**A/N: And the end of another chapter. Heh, the boys got duped. Anywho, reviews are always appreciated and I'm already working on the next chapter. So hopefully I can get that up soon, but school is starting soon, so...**


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